


Primeval Premonition or: Escape From the Alinor Justiciars

by Ihsan997



Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls Online
Genre: Action/Adventure, Adventure, Adventure & Romance, Demon/Human Relationships, Demons, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Forbidden, Friends to Lovers, Illegal Activities, Love Triangles, Mild Sexual Content, Mystery, Redemption, Running, Slow Burn, Villains to Heroes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-30
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2019-10-19 13:30:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 100
Words: 157,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17602262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ihsan997/pseuds/Ihsan997
Summary: A not-so-innocent sorcerer seeking forbidden knowledge learns that what’s in his head is a hot commodity when a demonic warrior turns her sights onto him. With the Justiciars, hired thugs, and multiple factions of Daedra after them, a mere trip to the library turns out to be more trouble than it’s worth.





	1. Come with Me if You Want to Live

**Author's Note:**

> I’m experimenting with a story based on short chapters - a linear progression, but with word counts lower than my usual fare.
> 
> I don’t own Elder Scrolls.

Late into the night that spring, a youngish Breton man sat as the only waking being in the Mage Guild’s library in Alinor. So still did the aspirant sorcerer sit as he buried himself deeper and deeper into cosmological tomes that he and his dark brown robes almost faded in to the scenery enough to make him undetectable among the maple furniture. Even the flame at the end of his candlestick barely flickered, adding to the static sense of stillness in the air. Hours ago had the rest of the inhabitants of the guild’s property gone to sleep, leaving the sorcerer to his own devices as he delved deeper and deeper into the origins of existence as the world knew it.

Though the candlelight didn’t flicker, he sensed the presence of visitors to the guild early enough to set a bookmark at the page he’d been reading. Light footsteps of a person who was neither sneaking nor looking to alert the whole building approached the doorway of that specific wing of the library, pausing and lingering behind a shelf for a few moments. When the sorcerer didn’t stir from his seat, the quiet visitor cleared his throat.

“Yes?” the sorcerer asked curiously.

Taking the question as a cue to engage, the visitor walked out from behind the shelf to face the Breton man at his desk. Arms folded behind his back, the rail thin high elf wearing the robes of an Aldmeri law enforcement officer held an intense stare alongside an oddly pleasant smile. Stiff as a board, the local man spoke in an almost stale tone.

“Lloyd Rolsen, visitor to the Aldmeri Dominion, member of the Mage’s Guild?” the high elf asked.

Realizing that he was face to face with a potentially important individual, the sorcerer named Lloyd quickly stood up and bowed. “Correct, sir,” he replied, though he didn’t extend his hand when the intense stare continued to burn onto him.

“Good. I’m Justiciar Druinald representing the immigrant affairs bureau.”

Lloyd immediately reached for his belt pouch and began to pull out a runed pamphlet. “Ah, yes. I have my identity documents from the Dominion right here, if you’ll take a look-“ Lloyd stopped when the officer named Druinald shook his head.

“Your immigration papers check out, I can assure you.” Druinald’s smile faded ever so slightly. “You could always try waiting for me to explain the purpose of my visit before offering me items I don’t need.”

Though the slight mockery was duly noted, Lloyd was well aware that the elven officer could have been much more condescending had he so desired. “I apologize, officer; I’ll try not to be so presumptuous.” Pausing briefly when he heard footsteps upstairs in the direction of the member bunks, Lloyd tried to avoid nervous assumptions and cooperate with the law official to avoid any problems. “I’m glad to cooperate with whatever you need this evening.”

When Druinald’s smile continued to lose its lustre, the Breton began to worry. “Good to know. Your cooperation isn’t absolutely necessary, in this instance, but is certainly preferred.” The high elf paused for a beat, clearly attempting to stoke tension.

In a foreign land under a rival political faction, Lloyd felt a sense of dread knowing that he has little recourse were he to be detained. “Whatever you need, Officer, I’ll do my best to help.”

“You already made that clear,” Druinald replied in that dry tone which was quickly becoming so unnerving. “We’ve opened a special investigation center to the east of Alindor, off the main roads. Perhaps we can relocate there to discuss a few matters you’ll be assisting us with.”

Lloyd felt his pulse throb hard in his neck a few times. “Oh my...is everything alright, justiciar?” he asked.

This time, Druinald didn’t engage in a dramatic pause. He didn’t really need to at that point. “We hope so.” Unfolding his arms, he nodded toward the doorway. “We’d best be on our way; your colleagues here are all sleeping, and it’s in everyone’s interests to avoid waking them.”

“Wait, we’re going now? In the middle of the night?”

Druinald began walking out of the library, prompting Lloyd to follow. “That’s correct. I believe we can arrive there by dawn.” When the two of them reached the anteroom of the guild, the front door was hanging open. “Ah, my colleagues have already collected your personal effects. We’re making good time.”

“My personal effects?” Lloyd asked in exasperation. “Am I under arrest?”

The two of them stepped outside to find Lloyd’s maple chest and a bag full of his clothing with two more high elves. They were unpleasant people, one short and heavy set by Altmer standards and the other sharp nosed and hawkish in appearance. Druinald closed the door of the guild, adding to Lloyd’s sense of entrapment when he wasn’t even free to close a door by himself.

As the two assistants cast simple enchantments to reduce the carry weight of Lloyd’s belongings, Druinald turned to face him with arms folded again. “There are more civilized terms we prefer to use.” The two other elves began to lift the chest and bag into a cart, and Druinald took the quiet moment to indulge in more curiosity than the Breton had ever known an Altmer official to. “You have an interesting reading list through the library here, Mr. 

A bead of sweat began to trickle down the young sorcerer’s forehead. “I didn’t know that such a list was kept,” he chuckled nervously.

Druinald didn’t bother answering his question. “Theories on life extension for humans, alternate proposals on the origins of the world, Dragon Breaks, languages native to the plane of Oblivion...and the runes for the enhancement of memory? I don’t think you even need the latter; you go through books even faster than our best native students.”

“Yes, well, that sounds rather interesting when it’s all read out loud like that.” Lloyd pulled at the collar of his robes. “Gosh, is it hot out here?”

Druinald continued to stare at him. “No,” the Altmer replied with a flat tone. “By the way, I’ll need you to wear this.” He produced a set of wrist cuffs with a snapping lock.

“Is this really necessary, sir?” Lloyd protested with a crestfallen look.

“Our protocols are necessary, yes; the dignity of putting the cuffs on yourself isn’t. Be grateful that I’m not slapping them on as if you were a petty thief.”

“I...very well. You have my gratitude.” Lloyd put the wrist cuffs on even as he considered every possible avenue of escape, whether physical or verbal. The exchange was happening so fast, far faster than the general pace of life in the Summerset Isles, and he felt unduly pressured.

Druinald stared at him with more fascination than intensity. “Those notes you wrote on pronunciation, the ones locked in your chest...how well can you speak languages native to Oblivion?”

Before either of them could react, a loud thud rang out followed by the sound of a body hitting the ground. When Druinald spun around, Lloyd caught a glimpse of the sharp-featured elf laying in a pool of its own blood. The short elf screamed just as a heavy object was swung down onto its head by a large figure in the dark. Druinald sprang into action, casting a quick fireball that sizzled with painful but minimal effect on the Daedric armor of the assailant. A swift elbow to the jaw knocked Druinald unconscious, and the demon spawn from another dimension likely caused further injury when she stepped on the justiciar in order to get to the sorcerer.

“What on 

Fast despite her stature, the lesser daedra grabbed ahold of Lloyd. “Come with me if you want to live!” she said in her warped, demonic voice.


	2. Kill the Unbeliever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minimal explanation, both for the first protagonist as well as the reader.

For a few seconds, the aspirant sorcerer froze not so much in fear as in confusion. He was half expecting the lesser daedra to remove her helmet and reveal one of his old friends from the guild branch in Daggerfall playing a prank on him. Lloyd was no stranger to the smell of blood, though, and the odor of the red liquid spilling from the two justiciar’s assistants indicated that the incident wasn’t a joke.

The lesser daedra pulled him toward an alleyway with surprising force. Forgetting that his hands were bound behind his back, he nearly lost his balance and garnered an irritated grunt from his savior (or new captor).

“Stay on your toes!” the demoness said in a warped voice, her Tamrielic painted with an Aldmeri accent.

Lloyd just spun around and searched for witnesses in the immediate area. Whether he’d call for help or flee the scene of the crime of one were around, he didn’t know, and he wouldn’t know because the streets were empty at that time of night. In his stupor, all he could blurt our was: “wait, my stuff!”

Having made a terrible impression, he provided no defense when the dragging demoness glared at him. “You’re mortal, worry about your life!” she hissed while pushing him behind a stack of crates in an alleyway. She hid next to him as they waited for sounds of any intruders upon the scene, but there was nary a sound to be heard.

Too overwhelmed to be properly afraid of the demon spawn from Oblivion, Lloyd spike as if he were addressing a normal being. “Can you help me get out of these cuffs, please?”

The lesser daedra glared at him again with those black, shark-like eyes of hers. She was so close to him behind the crates that he could feel a slight chill from the metal of her armor along with the heat of her piercing gaze. “No,” she replied stiffly, and only then did he realize what he was trying to appeal to.

“Fine, but there will be more of that guy’s colleagues coming soon, and...” Finally able to think clearly once she wasn’t pulling him down the street, he attempted to figure out just what was happening to him. “So those lawmen were going to kill me and you, a daedra, are going to save me?” he asked skeptically.

Visibly annoyed by his questions, the lesser daedra began to look around the alleyway they were hiding in. “Yes, I’ve been tasked with saving you from them, but they aren’t the ones who’ll kill you,” she replied while cautiously peering down the rest of the alley.

Sensing intrigue behind whatever she was claiming, Lloyd resigned himself to captivity; even if she were lying, he’d need her to believe he was cooperative in order to escape. “If you want to help me, for whatever complex political reasons you have in Oblivion, you’ll need to know the easiest way out.”

“Mortal, stop talking!” the daedra said tersely and rather stereotypically.

“Fine, rely on your sense of direction instead of the shortcut I know after staying here for the past year.”

His insult was subtle yet likely felt given her gasp - intelligent species of daedra were known, quite ironically, for their poor sense of direction. The tactic worked when she shook her head in a sort of resigned, low-intensity resentment.

“What are you rambling about?”

“There’s an apartment building for beastfolk immigrants eight blocks down from here. The cellar has two doors - one to a safe access tunnel leading out of the city walls and another - whoa!”

Despite being rather strong for a Breton, Lloyd was surprised at how easily the demoness swung him around by the fabric of his robes and then thrust him forward. “Lead the way and be quiet about it!” she hissed.

And so he did. Weaving in and out of the various alleyways he’d come to know when dealing in banned books and censored newsletters, Lloyd crouched and crept in a circuitous route toward what the locals called house betmer. The demon spawn didn’t release her grip from his arm, similar to a bailiff who didn’t trust the accused not to flee. He felt patronized, but every time he wondered why his supposed rescuer was so curt, he reminded himself of what he was dealing with. Eventually, they reached the end of the alley across from the rundown apartment building in question. To their luck, the gate to the walled complex was hanging open and the doorman has left his post as usual in Alindor’s most neglected neighborhood.

“Why are you stopping?” she asked in frustration.

“We need to be sure the coast is clear before we cross the street.” He tried to turn around to look at her, but she grabbed him by the beard and forced him to look forward. “I’m just trying to see if you’re carrying a weapon. It would almost look as conspicuous as me being handcuffed.”

“No, I’m not going to free you yet, and yes, I’m armed. Just get us across the street!”

“Down there!” yelled a voice from above them.

Metal hummed as the lesser daedra pulled out her weapon and pushed Lloyd to the ground. He rolled over just in time to see some maniac wearing a Stendarr pendant leaping from the rooftops all the way down to the alley where they were. Wearing a tattered robe and leather mask, the interloper raised a ceremonial mace above his head.

“Kill the unbeliever!”


	3. No I Will Not Remove Your Handcuffs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cue the low-volume thriller music as they escape through the streets.

Just when the situation seemed to have calmed down, here came a maniac swinging a mace in an alley. Lloyd rolled around on the damp cobblestone as he struggled to stand, a feat which proved exceptionally elusive without the use of his hands. Why his daedric rescuer had decide to push him down was a mystery.

“Death for infidelity!” the masked psycho yelled while charging with its ceremonial weapon.

On cue, the lesser daedra pulled out a great sword and preempted the attacker. In a matter of seconds, she severed the masked maniac’s arm and head, leaving blood splattered on the tattered green robes and the Stendarr pendant clinking on the ground. More footsteps echoed in the alleyway from above them.

“So these are the ones sent to kill me?” Lloyd asked while rolling to a wall, bracing his head against it, and walking himself up into a standing position.

Two more of the crazies wearing plain, undecorated leather masks leapt down into the alley. “What do you think?” the daedra asked condescendingly as she rushed toward the newcomers.

To the sound of metal clashing, Lloyd finally stabilized himself enough to catch a glimpse of the scene. The body parts of the first attacker were conveniently in the shadows of the alley and the lesser daedra was swiftly performing the same acts of violence on the two other maniacs, but the noise level was far too loud. To his chagrin, a window on the third floor of whatever bunkhouse they were next to lit up with candlelight as disturbed neighbors began to talk angrily in the opposite building. There was too much noise, and they were likely to get caught if it didn’t stop...or if they didn’t move on quickly.

Two more bodies hit the ground dead just as two more hit the ground alive from the rooftop. They both charged the demoness who was Lloyd’s only source of safety while his hands were bound. It was a tough spot: there was so much noise wherever she went that he was likely to be caught by city guards, but he was handcuffed and too defenseless to simply leave her to her own devices and escape by himself. When one of the last two crazed Stendarr zealots distracted the daedra for a sneak attack by the other, he sprang into what little action he could.

Before the second zealous maniac could backstab her, Lloyd front kicked the masked man in the lower back hard enough to send both of them to the ground. The maniac hit the ground face first in a pile of broken glass, and Lloyd fell backwards into a muddy puddle that ruined his clothes even further. The daedra riposted the first maniacal zealot while glancing at the second and then at Lloyd, hands still bound yet having managed to prevent her from taking a knife to the throat.

“Hurry, the neighbors are going to sound the alarm!” he gasped while rolling around in the mud to get himself up again.

Though only her eyes were visible through her helmet, she was still able to project a rather incredulous expression at him while she stabbed the second maniac laying in a pile of glass. For a second he thought she’d say something indignant about him telling her to hurry, but thankfully, she stopped herself when a window opened four floors above them.

Some variety of elf looked down into the alleyway, likely unable to see the dead bodies and lesser daedra below in the shadows. “Whoever it is, I’m calling the guards!” yelled a drowsy woman with a local accent. “It’s after midnight!”

Another window opened on the second floor but much further back into the alley. “Hey, what’s with all the yelling?” another local yelled back.

“These people are causing a ruckus in the middle of the night!”

“Why are you yelling at me?” the second local asked all the way down the alley.

“I’m not yelling!”

“Yes you are!”

“No I’m not!”

The daedra took the argument as an opportunity to flee, grabbing Lloyd by the arm and lifting him up to his feet. “Move, we aren’t safe here,” she ordered while dragging him to the street.

“Wait, check if there are observers first,” he protested.

“Mortal, I’m the only thing between you and either jail time, execution, or worse. I set the rules.” With that, she grabbed him by the arm again and dragged him straight into the street and toward the open gate of the beastfolk complex. She didn’t notice the motley crew of figures down the street watching them until her captive rescuee spoke up.

“Yep, we have observers,” he whispered while pointing down the street with his nose.

They were perhaps a thirty meters away, concealed beneath an extinguished lamppost. The aura of more daedric magic wasn’t lost on the young sorcerer, though, just as it wasn’t lost on the daedra dragging him like a backstreet perpetrator. Three figures, two humanoid and one like an ape, stood motionless. Lloyd could feel his own protector stiffen up and squeeze his arm a little harder.

“Those psychos in the alley were the ones seeking to get you executed,” she whispered urgently. “These people are the ones who want something worse.”


	4. Your Time Has Come

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The competition to kidnap one unsuspecting sorcerer is starting to heat up.

Even when the lesser daedra pulled Lloyd behind her so roughly that he almost lost his footing, her compatriots down the street didn’t immediately pursue. The unlikely duo made it through the gate and into the anteroom of the rundown apartment complex before they even heard the sound of any further ill-wishers. The cracked floor was covered in old rugs and abandoned shoes, and the sounds of insomniacs conversing could just barely be heard.

The two of them paused, and the daedra looked at him expectantly. All he could discern about her was her martial background due to her armor, which hid all of her save a pair of black eyes like a shark’s. The stunning lack of hostility was most surprising, though. There was certainly annoyance directed at him, but no hostility.

“We only have a few seconds - this is on you,” she whispered with a renewed sense of urgency. “Show the way.”

“Who are-“ Lloyd stopped himself when he realized that questions about what was happening would only waste time. “Apartment 2B is unlocked. It’s occupied, but only in the daytime.”

“You said we can escape through the cellar.”

“Yes, and apartment 1B is also unoccupied now, but it’s barricaded from the inside. We need to go to the apartment above it, break in, drop through the floor, and use a passageway built by the-“

Footsteps approached rapidly from outside, prompting Lloyd to fall silent. In an instant, the daedra grabbed him by the collar of his robes and pulled him beneath the stairwell. She wedged the two of them into a crevice under the stairs so narrow that they were pressed flush against each other with little space to move. They were so close that he could feel her breath brushing his face.

“This is awkward,” he whispered with a wry smile.

He half expected the demoness to growl at him, but she actually displayed a bit of personality other than growling orders. “Just don’t make eye contact and it’s like it isn’t happening,” she whispered back, almost promoting him to laugh.

They paused and waited, listening to the rapidly approaching footsteps outside. The sound eventually paused as they did, lingering just beyond the building.

“Dominion Guard reporting,” came the sound of another local accent from outside. “Let any non-residents of this building show themselves.”

The daedra silently clamped her hand over Lloyd’s mouth, garnering an angry glare from his side this time - he hadn’t even been planning to talk. She seemed determined to drive home the fact that she didn’t trust him not to either run away or get caught. “Stop staring at me,” she hissed at him when she noticed his expression.

“Who goes there?” the guard asked again, causing them both to stiffen up in their hiding place. “Identify yourselves.”

With the guard obviously speaking to their pursuers, there would only be a few seconds to act. Before Lloyd could even squirm in the daedra’s grip, however, she’d already dashed from their hiding place, dragging him behind her once more. He caught one glimpse of the Dominion Guard being hit by a fireball through the doorway as he began to stumble up the stairs after his rescuer. Oddly, nobody in the most disadvantaged apartment building in Alindor seemed bothered by the sounds of a fight outside, and the light conversations behind closed doors continued unabated. Lloyd lost his footing on the last step to the second floor, and his daedra protector simply dragged him along the ground toward apartment 2B.

“Get up!” she growled with a sense of urgency that sounded strange coming from a person he didn’t know.

By the time she’d pulled him back up to his feet, the fight downstairs had escalated, and the guard let loose a battle cry followed by a death groan. The voice of a dying scamp, a sound which wasn’t unfamiliar to Lloyd, accompanied the ruckus, as did another fireball. He turned to face the door of the apartment in question.

“Okay, do you have a lockpick?”

Wood splintered as his daedra protector kicked the door down, revealing a dilapidated apartment littered with cheap furniture and empty skooma bottles. “Well, that works,” he said as he tried to walk inside.

Destruction magic boomed in his ears as he felt the tingle of flames whizz by his back. “Get down!” his daedra cried while shoving him out of them way.

A fiery burst that hurt his ears echoed off of her armor as she took the brunt of a magical attack to her chest. The burst of the wall behind her was even louder as the very plywood comprising the walls of the cheap apartments broke apart. The entire wall from floor to ceiling broke apart from the impact of the lesser daedra who’d been on his side was blasted straight through it, creating a rush of sawdust and cobwebs kicked up by the force of the attack. Chips of plaster continued to fall from the ceiling as Lloyd rolled over and sat up.

Just as he was about to ask if she was okay, more footsteps approached from the stairs behind him. The mage who’d blasted her didn’t waste time, and Lloyd turned to face their newest attacker. Despite the hood, he knew he was dealing with another lesser daedra. And this one most definitely wasn’t on his side.

“Mr. Rolsen,” the demon growled at him maliciously. “Your time has come.”


	5. See You Soon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Also known as: throwdown in a rundown building downtown, part 1 of 2.

Handcuffed, on the ground, and without anyone to back him up, Lloyd had little recourse when faced with a figure who supposedly sought to grant him a fate worse than death. Running out of options, he played dumb and tried to act as innocently as possible.

“Time for what, exactly?” he asked the hooded demon staring down at him.

The hostile daedra allowed for a dramatic pause. “It is time...to meet your doom,” the lesser daedra whispered hauntingly.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Doom,” Lloyd said, already garnering an irritated growl while he pushed himself against the door frame and slid into a standing position. “Say, you wouldn’t mind releasing me from these cuffs, would you?”

“Silence! We shall not be trifled with!” the demonic mage barked at him.

Instead of silence, the hostile daedra was met by the angry cry of the friendly daedra. Leaping from a pile of broken wooden planks and plaster, the armored demoness who’d been helping Lloyd so far charged in between them. The daedra mage was knocked back like a rag doll and slammed into a heavy wood column near the stairs. The entire column cracked, leaving the mage to whimper on the ground like a beaten dog.

His protector breathed heavily and snarled down at the mage as she lifted her greatsword to execute him. Her helmet and chest plate had been singed by the magical flames during the blast, leading her to remove them before she’d charged. For the first time, Lloyd got a good look at the guarantor of his safety up to that point. Beneath the sawdust and scrapes from splinters was the face of a Dremora, one with dark, charcoal grey skin and crimson tattoos. She was strikingly beautiful despite her injuries, and Lloyd had to shake his head to focus on what was happening around him.

The hostile daedra on the floor was also a Dremora, bearing albino white skin and horns on his chin. The man coughed up demon blood and held his hand out in defense, losing it when Lloyd’s protector vented some of her anger by cutting the limb off. The Dremora mage screamed when his hand hit the floor, betraying the supposed fearlessness that the daedra liked to project.

Before his protector could finish the job, she was knocked back by a flash of steel rushing from the stairwell. The other daedra he’d seen earlier swung a series of blades, forcing the Dremora warrior to defense herself. She knocked her lighter opponent away with a counterstrike, putting space between them. A Dark Seducer sneered at her, dual wielded blades gleaming in the light of the candles down the hallway. They didn’t waste time before throwing themselves at each other.

Metal screamed as the pair swung for each other at full throttle, seeking killing blows with every strike. Though he’d studied every form of daedra known to man and mer, and he’d encountered and even banished a few, he’d never seen specimens of the two species in front him him alive. Their furious duel helped him to understand why they were both feared.

In the midst of the fight that raged from the hallway and into the partially destroyed apartment 2B, the Dremora mage got back up. Cradling his bloody stump of a right arm, the demon tried to cast another fireball spell until Lloyd got a running start and kicked the other man hard in the groin. The Dremora mage was actually lifted into the air by the force of the kick, and he dropped to the ground like a mortal while clutching his crotch. At the same time, metal cut through the air and spun dangerously close to the two of them. A partying dagger stuck into the hallway floor like a projectile, followed by the two broken halves of a chair, then a broken sword hilt, then the Dark Seducer all in a row. The enemy demoness’ armor had been badly damaged by the heavy edges of a blade, and she seemed dazed by being bashed around even if she hadn’t been cut.

The Dremora warrior emerged from the broken wall, leaping forward and stabbing her greatsword into the floor right where the Dark Seducer’s head had been a second before. The hostile daedra warrior scrambled away on all fours, clearly defeated until yet another person ran up the stairs to join the fray.

Bleeding and heaving, an injured man wearing sullied robes leapt over the railing over the stairwell. The leather mask and Stendarr pendant left no mystery as to who he was.

“I killed you!” Lloyd’s daedra defender hissed.

“Not today, demons!” the maniac yelled at them all.

All three daedra gasped in sincere offense at being called demons, though the Dremora mage only lasted half a second longer because the Stendarr zealot cut his head off. The paper white head rolled over to Lloyd, staring up at him as the lifeblood spilled out.

“I’ll see you soon, Mr. Rolsen,” the severed head said chillingly just prior to the passing of its soul into Oblivion.


	6. IT’S EVERYWHERE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And we have throwdown in a rundown building downtown, part 2 of 2. But the story’s only just getting started.

In a flash, the Dremora warrior jumped over the headless corpse and impaled the Stendarr zealot through the shoulder with her sword, pushing the masked man back. Rather than counterattack, he reached for his belt pouch and scooped up a handful of cooking flour, of all things.

“Close your eyes-“

Lloyd’s warning was cut off by the Dremora’s grunt when the zealot flung the power in her eyes. Wrenching away from him, she deepened the cut into his body before hitting him through the railing at the top of the stairs and sending him down hard onto the marble tiles of the first floor, inadvertently followed by the severed albino mage head. Bone fractures echoed back up to the second floor, but it was little comfort as the Dremora warrior stumbled away rubbing her eyes. Half-blind and coughing, she shambled without direction down the hallway, passing by their last remaining enemy.

A sadistic grin marked the visible half of the Dark Seducer’s face when she saw her opponent disabled. Lloyd realized that he not only needed the Dremora for protection when his hands were literally tied but also that, despite common sense dictating otherwise, he was in the daedra’s debt.

When the Dark Seducer circled around the Dremora, he dashed in between them, working to ignore the fact that jumping in the middle of daedric infighting was at least the third stupidest thing he’d ever done in his life. “I believe I’m the person you’re looking for!” he said, attempting to distract the aggressor with inappropriately timed humor.

She didn’t buy it. “Sure, after I’m done taking out the trash,” the Dark Seducer taunted right back. She charged, and when Lloyd kept trying to block her from her target, she grabbed him by the leg and flipped him onto a rickety dining table in the dilapidated apartment.

The piece of furniture broke apart beneath his weight, knocking the wind out of him and dazing him temporarily. Buried in debris and without his arms free, he rolled around and hurt himself a bit just trying to get back up. He couldn’t see where the fight was, but he heard the sound of the Dark Seducer tackling the Dremora into the apartment and pounding the holy hell out of her. He regained a general sense of direction when he saw the Dremora’s gauntlets flying across the room; a sense of urgency set in when he realized that the hostile daedra was removing his protector’s last form of resistance so she couldn’t fight back. There wasn’t much time to turn the conflict around.

To the sound of a terrible ass kicking, Lloyd crunched himself into a ball and started to slip his legs up and over his handcuffed wrists. Since he was no longer the primary target, he was able to do what he’d been hoping for throughout the whole ordeal. In a matter of seconds, he’d slipped his hands under his feet and then in front of him, stood back up, and spied the Dark Seducer was beating the living daylights out of the poor Dremora on the other side of the apartment.

For all her strength, his protector still hadn’t recovered from the powder in her eyes, and all she could do was flail wildly as the Dark Seducer straddled her and pummeled her halfway into Oblivion. When the Dark Seducer started to strangle the Dremora and cackle like a psychopath, the latter’s limbs began thrashing less fervently and her throat gurgled. Lloyd began to panic, realizing that there wasn’t much time before their last enemy choked his only ally to death (or at least to banishment from the realm).

On a whim, the human grabbed a thick piece of plywood from the table, launched forward, and slammed the blunt instrument onto the back of their mutual enemy’s neck. The Dark Seducer yelped and wavered, wobbling on top of the Dremora who could only push weakly against her tormenter at that point. Though the Dark Seducer was trying to maintain her perch, she wasn’t as strong as the Dremora, plus she was dizzy and incoherent from the blow. With his hands now in front of him, Lloyd was able to drag their enemy daedra - though with some difficulty - to the only corner of the secret apartment that he knew had a dangerous fall. Without thinking, without planning, and without fully intending what came next, he dragged the Dark Seducer around a corner of apartment 2B and threw her...down the cracked, dangerously exposed hole of the latrine.

Her scream when she hit the bottom was beyond epic. How the windows in the whole building didn’t shatter was a minor miracle, and Lloyd’s curiosity caused him to peek quickly down the shaft.

“Oh my word, that’s the septic tank!” he gasped, not feeling guilty so much as shocked at how much worse his revenge was than he’d intended.

“Aaaaaarrrrrrgggggghhhh! Aarrgghh aaahhh, IT’S EVERYWHERE!” the Dark Seducer sobbed.

If only to stifle the painfully loud weeping, Lloyd covered the latrine with a porcelain slab and shut the half-rotten door of the washroom behind him. Finally able to act without the pressure of being chased, he realized how fast his heart was beating from the unexpected danger of the night. He’d experienced plenty of violence while on the Daggerfall City Guard, but he hadn’t expected a night quite like this, in a place like this, at a time like this.

Groaning and rolling over, the Dremora warrior tried to fight back to a sitting position. Lloyd hurried over to her and knelt down to brush plaster and wood chips off of her. Her face was bloodied and her neck bruised, not to mention the likely abrasions from being blasted through a wall. Incredibly considering what she’d been through, she resisted his attempt to inspect her injuries.

“You helped me; let me heal you,” he said insistently.

“Leave...we have to leave,” she wheezed while leaning away from his hands. She did let him help her up even when she avoided inspection of her flesh wounds.

“Please, it will only take a second. You don’t need to walk around hurt.”

She was about to refuse again when the door to apartment 2A opened. They both turned to find a Khajiit resident staring right at them, the wrecked apartment, and the headless corpse in the hall.


	7. The Wrong Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being too set in one’s ways can cause communication problems.

A quiet moment passed as the sleepy-eyed Khajiit surveyed the wreckage in the wake of the showdown in the rundown downtown. Aside from a few stray chunks of the rafters falling from the ceiling and hitting the floor in the now open air apartment, nothing punctuated the eerie quiet as a bystander caught a full view of the aftermath of the incident.

The Dremora’s neck vibrated when she tried to growl, still hurt from the stranglehold. Because she was still leaning on him for balance, Lloyd felt her attempt to advance toward their observer aggressively. Even when hurt, she was powerful; Lloyd was large by the standards of Bretons, but he had no doubt that he was only able to hold her back due to her injuries. Thankfully, their observer didn’t realize that the Dremora was trying to push past him.

The Khajiit blinked obliviously. “Hey,” it said in a tired, unassuming voice.

The pause which followed wa so awkward that Lloyd couldn’t help but break it. “What?” he asked nonchalantly.

Completely unafraid despite the headless body on the floor, the Khajiit made a polite request. “Keep it down, you two,” the felinoid said without a hint of discomfort or suspicion. And just like that, it shut the door and took a long hit from a skooma pipe loudly enough for them to hear it. Life in the disadvantaged apartment block continued as normal, save the hostile daedra screaming and clawing her way out of a septic tank.

Wincing in pain, the Dremora forced herself to walk and retrieve her sword. Lloyd noticed that her back seemed hurt, likely from being blasted through a wall, and he walked to let her lean on him until she shoved him in front of her.

“The exit...you said there’s an exit!” she said in her echoing voice still marked by fatigue.

“At least let me...” The sorcerer stopped when he heard more noise coming from the cavernous latrine hole in the bathroom. “Alright, I can get us to a safe place in the sewers leading out of here so I can heal you.”

Instead of accepting his help, the Dremora bared her sharp teeth at him. “Get us out before more enemies find us!” she hissed quietly while squeezing his arm hard enough to leave a mark.

“Okay, Okay, just relax! There’s a makeshift stairwell in the kitchen. The smugglers who live here broke the floor open and built it, so tread lightly.”

The two of them hurried across the debris-covered floor of the musty apartment and into the kitchen, where the floorboards had been ripped apart to make room for a sloppily crafted set of stairs. The daedra warrior leaned heavily on the sorcerer as they descended though she gradually seemed to regain her energy as they descended into apartment 1B below. Crates of stolen merchandise, empty drink bottles, and a disgusting looking bed were all that marked the barricaded apartment, and Lloyd wasted no time leading the way to a secret escape broken through the concrete floor to the basement. One broken escape shaft through the basement wall later, and the pair had made it to the Alindor sewers - just as they heard the sound of more guards approaching at the ground level.

Finally having his hands in front of him, Lloyd was able to function a little more capably. He conjured an orb of candlelight, less effective without full range of hand motion but just bright enough to save them from stepping in puddles or worse as he followed a familiar route to a quick escape through a drainage pipe. Once they’d made enough turns to prevent any sort of tracking, he led her into a dead end within the tunnel system which had been converted into an unused closet. When he closed the door behind them, his companion began searching the jagged, uneven walls of the makeshift storage room.

“This is a dead end, mortal!” the Dremora hissed. She tensed up so much that so did Lloyd, but he tried to ignore the feeling while beginning to trace runes over the door with his fingers. “Are you deaf? You’ve backed us into a corner!”

Her sense of haste only increased his determination, and he hurried in his movements. “Don’t worry, these runes will provide a sound barrier so nobody can hear us...and those runes will increase the likelihood that anything passing by will subconsciously ignore the door. I’ve had to use these a number of times-“

The lesser daedra wouldn’t hear any of it. “You fool, why would you do this? Why would you even consider this? You’re ruining everything!”

“I don’t know what ‘everything’ refers to here, or how it’s all being ruined, but you have nothing to fear.”

“What!” she shouted indignantly, thankfully just after the soundproof runes took effect. “How dare you - my kind know no fear!”

Pausing for a moment, Lloyd turned to glance at her sympathetically despite the outrage she’d directed at him. “I’m sorry. That came out wrong. I meant something different.”

This time, she didn’t have an answer prepared. Her jaw opened to retort, but she stopped herself when she realized - after a short delay - that he wasn’t arguing with her. “You...Yes, it certainly did come out wrong!”

He continued finishing the last set of runes. “What I meant was that we lose nothing by waiting, and we gain quite a bit strategically. The city guard will be looking for both of us either way, but they’ll be on especially high alert in the immediate aftermath; I know from experience.”

She remained quiet for a few seconds as he carved the runes, but eventually she overcame her previous outrage. “That’s a sound plan,” she conceded.

“Thank you. Also, you’ll need the time to recover from the fight-“

Her fist pounded into the wooden doorframe, shaking it so much that the structure nearly broke (which would have negated the runes). She groaned in pain from the effort, but she left her fist on the door as if to make a point. Not ironically, it also missed his head by only a millimeter, and he could feel her breath on the back of his neck as she huffed angrily.

“Did I say something wrong again?”


	8. Introductions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The only two non-hostile characters so far slow down to catch their breath.
> 
> This is the first normal-length chapter.

Lloyd held absolutely still, looking at the fist planted on the door. He’d clearly struck a nerve, and he paused on instinct while waiting to see what his rescuer would do. She was still breathing down the back of his neck when she spoke.

“Don’t assume things, mortal,” she hissed at him.

Despite the front of aggression, there was a defensiveness to her tone that was just barely detectable. Lloyd felt more pity than resentment, and he finished tracing the last of the runes before he answered. “I can see that I’ve offended you,” he replied unassumingly.

“You don’t understand who you’re speaking to,” she said, adding nothing or their exchange save more evidence that she was upset.

“You’re absolutely correct,” he said calmly, his curiosity as well as his deduction preventing him from actually fearing her anger. He remained facing the door to avoid challenging her, but his own patience for being kept in the dark had worn thin. “I don’t understand you, and that’s probably why I’ve upset you. If we’re going to make it out of here successfully, then we’ll need to actually discuss why you’re helping me.”

Her rage slowly fading, she continued holding her fist on the door for a few more seconds. Even though she had him cornered against the wall without enough space to even turn around and face her, she remained stiff like a person who felt trapped. A measure of discomfort marked her movement when she removed her fist from the door, and he moved slowly when he turned around to face her.

He decided to use his knowledge to diffuse the situation - as well as revisit the elephant in the room which had triggered her in the first place. “Your people are a martial race, yes? The cooperation and synergy involved in such a lifestyle will be necessary for us to survive this...whatever this is.”

That beautiful face he’d only seen one time before, now sadly blemished by swelling and cuts, stared at him cautiously. To see a being so powerful, and in such an outwardly advantageous position, so hesitant and uncomfortable easily earned the sorcerer’s sympathy. He didn’t let the silence linger over her.

“Look, I won’t pretend to understand exactly what lead you here; I know that the politics of Oblivion are convoluted. However, full disclosure will increase our chances of success on any mission. Wouldn’t you agree?“

Her two black orbs finally focused on him instead of the air around his face, and he could feel her discomfort dwindling. “Agreed, mortal,” she replied with a measure of confidence in her voice that made him smile. That smile almost out her off again, but he made sure to keep her talking and avoid awkward silences.

“Good, Good. I think it’s fair to ask: do you know my name already?”

“Yes, I’ve been informed.”

“You have my gratitude for your assistance, whatever your motivation might be. You must understand my desire to know who it is I must thank.” She opened her mouth to speak, but stopped short, showing a row of bloodied, sharp teeth slightly exposed in a quaint simile of her. He’d have to take the lead on this. “I’m not requesting your true daedric name; this isn’t a ploy to catch you unaware. I must know how to refer to my new, and now perhaps only, comrade in arms.”

His plan seemed to be working little by little, and her stoic and almost surly self-confidence began to regrow. “You may call me Tammaeroth,” she said with less hesitance in her still cautious tone.

He tried to extend his hand, though it was difficult since she still had him backed against the wall. “Then I’m glad to formally meet the person who’s saved me from death, as well as something worse.” Perhaps due to her surprise at the gesture, she took his hand immediately without considering it. Her grip was firm despite the lack of callous on her hands; soft yet strong, in a way. He could still feel the twitch that signified physical pain, though, and his talent for daedric magic let him latently feel the amount of damage to her person upon contact. “Do you know why I was at the guild in Alindor?” She didn’t answer, merely staring at him as if she thought he was trying to trick her. “If you don’t mind me asking, of course.”

“I know enough...you’ve been shifting between cities on this island for library access. And you...you’re likely a member of the Mages’ Guild. And...” The Dremora named Tammaeroth cut her own sentence short, letting her lips hang open with her sharp teeth revealed again. Despite having him cornered in a closet, despite having saved him, she still seemed unnerved by their conversation. The usual arrogance and scorn Dremora were rumored to hold for mortals was absent; Tammaeroth just seemed uncomfortable, yet not enough to shut him down.

“I suppose you do know more than a little,” Lloyd said somewhat dishonestly, more to build trust than to merely flatter her. “But how do you know this? You must serve a different master than those other daedra.” Her thick lips curled over her canines at the mention of the enemies who’d attacked them. “I may have information that could help whatever mission you’re on,” he added.

For a few seconds, her eyes flitted between his and his shoulder, like she didn’t quite know where to look. “Their master...resents your existence,” she finally said.

He nodded, doing his best to get her relaxed enough to talk. He felt odd doing is considering the advantage she had over him; she could very well lie to him and kidnap him herself given his inability to cast spells or fight well with his hands bound. She didn’t seem to have a logical reason to feel so uneasy, though perhaps she knew enough to make her feel that way. Lloyd felt like he’d die if he couldn’t know.

“Am I correct to assume that your master sent you to stop them?” he asked. She nodded instead of speaking, but at least her eyes stopped darting around. “Well, Tammaeroth, I’m grateful that you were the one sent,” he said, trying to build up her comfort a little more. “My life, however short it may seem, could have been ended tonight if it weren’t for you. Thank you.”

She furrowed her brow at him, seemingly confused at first. “You’re welcome,” she said, possibly only due to shock.

“Now, the big question...who sent you?”

Reflexively, she squeezed his hand a bit harder as if the rather obvious question had been unexpected. “I...” She looked down and shook her head. “...need to consider how much you need to know, mortal.”

“I respect your discretion. You can call me Lloyd, by the way.”

Though she was gradually pushing herself to talk to him, the way she kept grimacing at him implied that she didn’t know how to regard a mortal who wasn’t running away frightfully. “Okay...Lloyd,” she answered skeptically.

Worried that their conversation would become tougher than pulling teeth, he sought a necessary diversion. “I have an idea. You can consider how much you can or can’t tell me, and I’ll tend to your wounds.” She squeezed his hand hard enough to pop his joints, and he winced under her suddenly hot gaze. “You fought valiantly,” he said, using pure flattery to prevent her temper from flaring again. “I don’t think anyone I’ve fought alongside would have survived the first minute. But before I summon the lost pieces of your armor for you, I’ll need to heal the battle scars you earned.”

For a few seconds, her nostrils flared angrily at him, and it finally clicked: her ego had been as bruised as her face. She’d almost been strangled to death, right in front of him, and the confidence which Dremora were stereotyped for might have been slighted. He’d seen it in his fellow mortals, and he was seeing it in his daedra protector right there. She must not have enjoyed letting him see her in a difficult spot.

Before he could speak, though, his statement clicked for her. “You can...conjure new armor for me?” she asked, much more open than previously.

“Well, yes. I can heal, though I’m not an expert. I can also conjure lost daedric armor, but only what you entered Mundus with, and only with a bit of time. It’s the least I can do for you, Tammaeroth...I think you might be one of only three people left on Nirn who I can still count on, however briefly I’ve known you.” He pretended to count in his head. “Between the alleys above and these tunnels, I guess about an hour.”

She caught his joke, but looked more confused than amused. For all her physical prowess, she seemed to be a pitiful creature, at least in the emotional sense; all humor and pleasantries were alien to her, and he wondered what sort of joyless world she lived in. Maybe one as drab and heartless as all he’d read about in demonic tomes.

“Look, those runes I wrote on the door are simple, but they’ll hold. We can slow down while whoever is after us wastes their time, and you can think about how much you’re able to tell me while we prepare for our next move. Do you like that plan?”

Tammaeroth looked at the runes and then back at him. “It’s suitable,” she replied.

“Good, Good. For now...could you get these handcuffs off of me, please?”

When she realized that they hadn’t let go of each other’s hands after shaking, she quickly withdrew hers from his. She almost took a step back, but that hesitation didn’t last for long. “You must be able to heal like this, without your hands free. You traced those runes like this.”

“I wish I could, but it’s not possible. Look, this is working so far,” he said while pointing to them both. “If we want it to continue working, we’ll have to build a certain level of trust. I’m sure you’re familiar with that, being from a military caste.”

Any discomfort she’d shown previously disappeared when he brought up her background. “I swear by all that’s unholy, if you attempt to run away from me, I will take you down.”

“Believe me, with so many people out to get me, I don’t want to be away from you.”

“Do not jeopardize my mission,” she warned with a wag of her finger. She still began to remove his handcuffs, though.

“I promise you that I won’t. It’s naturally in my best interests that you succeed.” Once she freed his hands, he spent time rotating his wrists and even his shoulders. “Good thing this will help us both...I was in bad positions every time I was knocked down.” He rolled his joints a little more to test for any sprains. “Alright. I don’t have my staff with me...or anything else other than what’s in my pockets, so I’ll need you to hold still.”

She nodded and stood up straight, initially watching his hands as if she expected a sneak attack. He moved slowly and measured the damage to her face, magically feeling the extent of her wounds. She stiffened up uncomfortably at how close he had to get, but her discomfort melted away quickly once he began to channel power into a rudimentary healing spell.

Focusing as best he could without a catalyst, he began to mend the damage caused by the Dark Seducer during the brawl: swelling over and under Tammaeroth’s eye, a cut on her brow over her other eye, cuts to the inside of her cheeks and gums. He waited for her to loosen up under the spell’s influence before moving on to her bruised neck.

All the unease and standoffishness he’d witnessed before faded away once her injuries disappeared. She even closed her eyes and let him work undisturbed, looking as if she were nodding off on a lawn chair during a particularly quiet afternoon. He actually hadn’t seen her appear that peaceful.

“I need to see your back, too,” he said, not without a measure of nervousness. She didn’t even open her eyes, merely humming her consent pleasantly; it reminded him of how he felt when visiting his favorite barbershop back in Daggerfall.

Latently worried about how she’d react, he walked around behind her and held his hands just above the thick cotton undershirt she’d been wearing beneath her armor. He could sense an inordinate amount of bruising as well as a few burn marks from the fireball she’d been hit with, and he flinched imagining the impact again. As he reached the end of his spell, she actually arched her lower back in reaction to his touch, and he has to struggle to prevent his mind from wandering to topics other than getting her healed up. His heart rate jumped when she leaned her head back into the spell, and it jumped even more when she suddenly pulled away.

With all of her wounds healed, the spell dissipated on its own, jolting her out of whatever trance she’d been under. He actually pulled his hands back, unsure of how she’d react, and watched her from behind as she fidgeted. She hugged herself and looked down.

“My armor,” she demanded, though her voice probably wasn’t as loud as she’d intended.

Dumbfounded for the first few seconds, he shook the stars out of his head when she cleared her throat.

“Yes, of course...let me handle that,” he said, shaking the tension out of his hands. The room they were hiding in felt a bit smaller than it had before.


	9. Many Questions, Partial Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The duo slow down to figure out what exactly they’re going to do. Answers are forthcoming, however painful the process may be.
> 
> Warning for a mandatory talky type of chapter.

After a good few minutes of tracing footsteps back into Oblivion, Lloyd had expect much of his mental focus on returning Tammaeroth’s missing pieces of armor to her. With his protector healed up and his hands free, he was able to rest off the excessive Magicka usage while she was able to mill about impatiently and ponder the meaning of the universe.

For reasons Lloyd could only speculate about, not a single person passed by their hiding spot in that musty old closet. “It’s too quiet,” Tammaeroth said after what felt like half an hour. She was standing in front of the door, but she turned halfway toward Lloyd expectantly.

Since his robes were already stained with muddy water, the sorcerer had been sitting right on the dirty, rocky floor of the closet. He opened his eyes and looked up at his only companion. “The guards don’t know about this place...not yet, at least. Those other daedra and the crazy religious folks are probably all dead. The smugglers who do their runs through here will probably lay low for a day or two. I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”

She seemed to disagree, but she also seemed uninterested in arguing the point. For a whil, she just continued to peek through the cracks in the door, keeping to herself while he rested. Eventually, she turned around to face him.

“My mission is to evacuate you from the Summerset Isles.”

He woke up from his daydream of her leaning her head back onto his shoulder at the sound of more serious news. Despite his urge to ask a million and one questions, he reminded himself to maintain gratitude toward his savior. “Thank you for telling me; it’s a relief to know a bit about what to expect. I appreciate it.” When she seemed taken aback by his thanks, he kept their dialogue going. “I assume that you’re telling me this so we can develop a concrete plan to get out of here.”

“You assume correctly, mortal.”

“Lloyd.”

“You...Alright.”

“Well, Tammaeroth, I think I know of a few ways we can get out of here. However, I can’t advise you on which way would be the safest - I’m missing too much information.”

Not so much skepticism as unease marked her eyes beneath her helmet. She was certainly hiding a lot from him, but he was also correct in guessing that she was missing just as much information as he was. She sighed and relented.

“I’ve considered what else I can tell you. There is more.”

“Good, that’s good to know. To start with, could I ask who those masked vigilantes were? The ones wearing pendants of the deity Stendarr?”

Tammaeroth folded her hands over her chest, more thoughtful than uneasy. “They’re a recently formed gang of youth, mostly from other regions. They noticed your library history, which includes a high volume of work on conjuration and daedra worship. They put two and two together.”

Lloyd hummed and nodded. “So you know about my interests.”

“I know enough. I also know that there are more of those miscreants, and that you’re not the only one on their list. They’re likely to hound you, though, for as long as you’re here. They know that the Justiciars were planning to make a move.”

“...and wanted to preempt them...so wait, and the Justiciars are also after me due to my library record? Me, specifically, and not other sorcerers?”

“You specifically. The rate at which you read and finish has made you a person of...moderate interest,” she said. She wouldn’t say any more, but she continued watching him as if knowing he’d ask for more.

This time it was his turn to sigh. “So how many different groups of crazy people are out to get me? Do you know the exact number?”

“Three, mort...Lloyd. Those vigilantes, the Justiciars, and the daedra you saw.”

“So the vigilantes want to kill me because I read a lot of books. The Justiciars want to arrest me because I read legal books but at a fast rate. What’s the third group’s problem?”

“I don’t know,” she said readily.

“And why are you helping me?”

She looked at him like he was stupid at first, then like he was a smart person saying something stupid. “That’s...my...mission,” she answered as if he were asking her a trick question.

“And who assigned it to you?”

“My lord,” she replied, shaking her head as if she couldn’t believe the question.

“And that would be...?” he asked. She didn’t answer his question at first, her body language losing its firmness. She was clearly caught off guard even though his line of questioning was rather natural; her reaction was that of a person who hadn’t interacted with others much, or at least not for a long time. “I’m asking for professional reasons, I assure you. Knowing who sent you can help me to understand what kind of support we could expect. Or what level, I mean.”

“There isn’t any other support,” she replied once she’d regained her bearings. “It’s just me.”

“So which lord sent you?” he asked to her silence. “Tammaeroth?”

“I heard you.” She paused and regarded him carefully. She was a curious creature; to see a Dremora lacking hostility was weird, but to see a Dremora out of her element rather than the other way around was beyond weird. “My lord is supportive of your endeavors.”

“I’m flattered to know that a daedric prince likes my reading list, but which...” Lloyd stopped himself and took a wild guess based on all the reading he’d done. “Oh my, this is fascinating.”

“What’s fascinating?”

“This. My situation, yours. I mean, your kind rarely serves Hermaeus Mora.” Tammaeroth’s eyes just about popped out of her head. After all her distant and even recalcitrant behavior, seeing such a lively response was rather cute. She seemed less demonic and more personable. “Are you surprised that I’ve figured out?” he asked.

“I...well...no,” she replied without confidence.

Slowly, he stood up and stretched after having sat against an uneven wall for thirty minutes. She instinctively moved to block the door, perhaps subconsciously preventing an escape attempt. He decided to ignore her paranoia and continue.

“You said you’re aware of my activities, so you must be aware that I pursue the weird for the sake of the weird. This is only a guess, but I can’t imagine any other daedric prince taking an interest in me simply because I read quickly. Except those other daedra who obviously serve a different master, but that’s a mystery.”

She was hanging on his every word, suddenly very interested once he’d broached the topic of her mission. He decided that they’d reached a suitable time for him to press her. “With that being said, there’s still a major piece to this puzzle missing,” he said, “and I hope that you and I have established enough trust in each other to talk about your mission.”

At first, she didn’t react. There was a world of anxiety in her eyes for reasons he couldn’t even start to guess. She held her ground but stood without the stalwart sort of tension she’d maintained when blocking his imaginary escape attempt. Although she clearly wasn’t happy with the subject, she remained facing him and unfolded her arms. “Perhaps,” she replied cautiously.

“I’m glad to hear that. You want to help me escape these islands, and I want to repay you for saving me back there. The more I know, the better I can help you to succeed. We’re in this together, for however long it lasts, right?”

Tammaeroth pursed her lips pensively and measured his words. “Agreed,” was all she said.

“Good. Good. So...where exactly are you supposed to take me after we escape Summerset?”

“Anywhere. I can take you anywhere but here, and my mission will be a success.”

“Then I promise that we’ll get out of here if we help each other out. Now, is the danger outside of Summerset any less than the danger here?”

“I don’t know, Lloyd. I just have to get you away from the danger you face now.”

“Alright, so the mission scope is crystal clear. Here’s a problem: I’ve never practiced teleportation, and I’ll probably be arrested if we board a ship at port. You’ll probably be attacked by the guards on sight.”

“That’s not a problem. There is a skein leading into Oblivion in the wilderness near Shimmerene; from there, other servants of Lord Mora can facilitate our passage through the realm and back out into Mundus.”

“That’s great news. We can get to Shimmerene on foot in less than a week. I have a friend on the island who could help us along the way...I’ll need to say goodbye, too. I don’t think there’s any avoiding that if there’s a warrant out for my arrest. We’ll need supplies along the way, and we’ll have to move at night, though it’s still night right now. But there’s also another matter.”

Almost comfortable, or what could be described as comfort, she waved her hand to him approvingly and without thinking. “Ask away,” she said.

“Thanks. You’ve been assigned this mission because Hermaeus Mora, for whatever reason, wants to see me keep doing what I’m doing. But how did you end up in his service-“

“No.”

Lloyd blinked and paused for a moment. “I don’t think what I asked is really a yes or no question.”

Her thick upper lip stiffened beneath her helmet. “You can’t ask that question.”

“Tammaeroth, we’ve been a great team so far, at least in the short time we’ve been handling this together. I’m hardly a person you need to worry about - I won’t use personal info against you. I’d just like to know who it is I owe my thanks to.” Her eyes began to dart around again, and he raised his open palms in a conciliatory gesture. “Look, I understand if interacting with mortals isn’t the usual for you. But surely you must be able to tell me what exactly led you here. You already seem to know that I’m a drifter who moves from one library to the next. What led to a daedra from a military caste to serve the lord of knowledge?”

Tammaeroth listened to his question intently and honestly. Although Lloyd hasn’t seen a tremendous number of daedra in his day, he’d killed, summoned, or simply talked to a few; none of them looked at him with the cordial, almost trusting way she looked at him then. He could tell that there was a lot going on in her mind as her frustration worked its way into her furrowed brow and chewed lower lip. It was almost as if she wanted to talk more, as if she wanted to reach out, and it was so unexpected from her kind. Hesitation radiated from her in waves, and in the end, the normal separation between mortal and daedra won out.

“We need to leave now,” she ordered, not demanding so much as focused. “You need food, water, and sleep. As long as I’m bound here in this realm, so do I. If you know a place to hide in, then take us there now.”

Lloyd couldn’t deny that he felt a little disappointed at the way she shut the conversation down after he’d tried to hard to make her feel comfortable. “Right, then. I guess that’s enough talk for now.” He moves to leave, but found that she was still blocking the way. “We need to go out this door and turn right. We’re a little far from the exit, but there are very few turns in the path.”

This time when she stared him down, there was less suspicion in her eyes and her tone. She almost seemed to be asking him as a favor. “Do not leave my sight, Lloyd,” she warned. “Don’t screw this up for me.”

“You have my word. I’ll just lead the way.”

With a slightly better understanding, they stepped out of the closet, into the tunnels, and right in front of an unsuspecting trio of vigilant fanatics wearing leather masks and Stendarr pendants. Everyone froze for a few seconds until one of them spoke.

“They were hiding here the whole time!” one of the zealots yelled.


	10. Flight in the Tunnels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our unexpected allies find that more than one organization has already tracked them down. No more explaining and discovering unless they can get out alive.

Maybe it was the yelling that set her off. Maybe it was being faced with strangers so suddenly after exiting a room. Maybe it was pent up stress from one hell of a night, or maybe it was the symbol of one of the nine divines on a pendant. Or maybe it was all of those things.

Whatever it was, it struck Tammaeroth like a bolt of lightning.

“Rraaa!” she growled while slicing her sword into the neck and jaw of the Stendarr zealot who’d yelled at them.

The man fell to the ground, hissing rather than screaming as he clutched his mangled face beneath the mask. Of the remaining two Stendarr vigilantes, one pulled out a war axe while the other flinched. A second later, a severed hand clutching an axe hit the ground, followed by the rest of the body with a slash across the chest. The one who’d flinched was riposted by the time Lloyd had pried the severed hand off the axe.

Tammaeroth glared at him for daring to touch a weapon. “I was a Daggerfall city guard for two years,” he said, though he could feel how rusty he’d become as he twirled the axe in his hands. She didn’t seem impressed.

“So you quit,” she said, finally revealing a measure of the condescension Dremora were famed for.

Though offended, he tried to ignore her remark and focus on escape. “I can support you,” he said defensively.

Just as she was about to open her mouth, an echoing shout reached them from far away. Looking back from whence they came, they both saw the fluttering of torches down the tunnel, maybe a hundred yards or more away. Tammaeroth initially tried to shove him behind her and engage their pursuers.

“We can lose whoever it is,” Lloyd said before casting his candlelight again. “They won’t be able to see this light from that far away from me.”

She gritted her teeth and looked from him to whoever was chasing them - be they Altmer guards, crazed zealots, or other daedra. Her inclination to fight rather than run actually wasn’t a universal feature of her kind, and Lloyd realized that the caution he’d been exercising when speaking to her was warranted; she was a blunt instrument, figuratively speaking.

Very carefully, he laid a hand on her shoulder and tried to pull her back, though he might as well have been pulling on a tree. “If we stop to fight every foe that comes our way, then we’ve let them dictate the terms of engagement,” he urged.

His military terminology resonated with her, and she actually turned back to look at him without condescension or scorn. Her nose wrinkled beneath her helmet, and she only needed a second to consider he’d said. “Show me the way to your friend’s location,” she demanded, always intent on dominating their teamwork even when she needed directions.

“It’s a two day walk from...never mind, let’s just get out of these sewers. We need to go this way-“

As soon as he pointed down the long, long stretch of tunnels leading out, Tammaeroth pushed him aside and stepped out in front, jogging forward and deftly avoiding puddles and rocks. Lloyd had to rush to catch up with her, not wanting to either lose her or incur her wrath for falling behind.

The two of them jogged in step with one another. He had to slow down since her pace was lessened by her heavy armor, though he was impressed by her endurance. She didn’t slow down from her jog for the whole ten minutes or so that they took to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Echoes of footsteps did follow them - after all, the path out of the sewers contained few twists or turns, and whoever was after them just had to run roughly straight to follow their trail. The light shined beyond the end of the tunnel, and the pair ran into a dilapidated atrium partially flooded with sludge just before the pipeline leading outside Alindor’s reaches.

Just as they passed out of the tunnel, Lloyd’s candlelight flickered and cast beams in front of them on its own accord. The unstable, shadowy outlines of four figures stood between them and the bright shaft leading out to ground level, granting the pair pause. None of the figures moved, not even when the two escapees slowed down.

“Can you see them?” Lloyd whispered.

“Yes, four. Three are daedra,” she whispered back.

“How do you want to handle this-“

Tammaeroth answered his question by charging straight into the four shadows, landing in the middle and swinging her blade. Apparently having thought themselves invisible, the four figures scattered and hit the ground, along with a shadowy object that appeared to be a severed limb. Cursing under his breath, Lloyd caught up to the group and raised his hand in the air, sending his candlelight higher up to illuminate the area; he needed Tammaeroth to stay alive, and jumping in the middle of four barely-visible outlines of enemies wasn’t exactly conducive to that.

As soon as he approached the group, the stealth spell that had been cast was broken by the candlelight, revealing two and a half hostile Dremora and a dreary-eyed high elf wearing the arcane robes of some cult. The butchered one of the Dremora rolled around on the ground, wailing clutching at his torn mage’s robes next to his severed arm. When Tammaeroth turned her fury on her other two fellow daedra, Lloyd hefted the war axe he’d grabbed and finished the job of ending the ashy white mage on the ground.

The people who’d been chasing them through the tunnels continued yelling and running, rapidly catching up with the group. Tammaeroth didn’t seem to notice yet, instead crashing against her two fellow Dremora warriors in a flash of sparks and screeching metal. There was almost a hungry desperation in the way she fought, rushed and overly aggressive as she swarmed over her two opponents. The Altmer who’d also been stealthed rose and stretched her narrow, spindley fingers. A flame ignited within her clammy palms, and by the time Lloyd pulled his axe from the daedra mage’s head, he realized that there wouldn’t be enough time to even throw the weapon in his fellow mortal’s direction.

Right when Tammaeroth disarmed one of her opponents and kicked the man into a putrid sludge puddle, the high elf let loose with a fireball aimed directly at her. Too focused on pressing her advantage against her opponent to notice, Tammaeroth didn’t even realize that a ball of fire was soaring toward her until it exploded harmlessly against a partition of light blue magic.

The flames spread outward in every other direction, lighting up the entire atrium and temporarily revealing the creepy crawlies watching the fight from their cracks and crevices. All three people turned to look at Lloyd and his glowing hands, struggling to put two and two together and realize that he’d thrown up a ward to defend his only ally at the last second.

Tammaeroth looked over at him even as she pressed her weapon against her opponent’s. “Why the hell didn’t you use that back in the apartments!” she yelled at Lloyd before parrying the other warrior’s blade.

“My hands were tied - literally! What was I supposed to oh shit-“

His retort was cut short when the Altmer sent a fireball his way. It was small, low-temperature, and sloppily cast, and he merely sidestepped to let it ignite the vines on the far wall of the atrium behind him. The flaming tongues of the projectile had still grazed his clothing just enough to set his sleeve on fire, and by the time the wall vines had started to smolder, Lloyd felt the intense sting of the flames on his arm. In an instant, he tore his right sleeve right off of his robes and tossed the fabric on the ground, watching as the skin of virtually his entire forearm, top and bottom, shriveled and warped in what would eventually turn into burn wounds.

The high elf seemed inexplicably angry at him for simply moving out of the way, far more than he’d have expected without any escalation. Her face pulled tight like a cadaver as she sneered at him until he recognized the specific design of her robes from a ritual manual he’d read months ago. Ignoring the nonstop pain in his arm, he sneered right back at her.

“Didn’t Meridia spank Molag Bal’s behind a few years ago?” Lloyd said, both identifying the master whom the mortal elf served and also tossing out a passive-aggressive insult.

“Blasphemy!” the Altmer gasped, and she began to cast a barrage of fireballs at him. “Do not insult Lord Bal!”

The heat on Lloyd’s skin was palpable, and he felt a twinge of fear for the first few moments. Indeed, he hadn’t partaken in armed conflict in years, and he felt the rust on his magic just as he had with the axe. The great balls of fire dissipated against the ward he’d conjured, but he could still feel the sensation of a temperature that was too high for his liking. The Altmer yelled at him in her language while the Dremora brawl for all played itself out across the room, the high elf’s frustration visible in the deep, almost injurious looking lines in her face. On a whim, Lloyd tested his spell absorption and actually reached a hand to the edge of his ward upon the last projectile cast.

The fireball fizzled out against the palm of his hand rather than dissipating as it has against the ward, causing the elven Molag Bal cultist to screech. “Enough!” she yelled while throwing both of her hands in the air.

The oxygen around her began to pop, and dust and debris from the floor began to swirl. Pieces of detritus and waste ignited, twirling around in the air as fuel for a firestorm brewing much faster than the human sorcerer would have expected. Panicked at the possible consequences, Lloyd dug deep into his Magicka pool and lashed out with a degenerative spell of entropy aimed at the cultist.

“Aaaiieeee!” the Altmer cultist shrieked, more from shock than the actual force of the attack as her molecules trembled and partially broke down. Her image became blurred and distorted even more than it was from the energy bolts crackling out of and then back into her. A cool sensation like a second wind filled Lloyd, and he watched the warped skin of his forearm mend and reform as the entropy spell restored him at the high elf’s expense.

With the spell fading, he ran directly at the cultist. Fiery trails swirling in the air nipped at his face and hands, but the effects of his entropic lifedrain battled with the damage to his skin in a back and forth contest between hot and cold. In the middle of another fireball cast, the cultist actually paused, dumbfounded to see another mage running into melee range. Luckily for Lloyd, the fact that he’d actually had a few years of martial training made him not quite skilled enough to tumble with the Dremora, but easily skilled enough to bully around other spellcasters. The high elf died immediately upon being struck with his axe, and, for the first time in years, Lloyd had the blood of another mortal on his hands.

Despite the Molag Bal cultist having clearly wanted to end his life, the human was still struck with the long forgotten shameful nausea he’d felt the first time he’d killed another person. Lloyd doubled over in the middle of the battle, nearly retching until he heard yelling from two different directions. He looked up, first seeing Tammaeroth as she severed the head of the other Dremora she’d been fighting. The sound of a heavy weight hitting the ground drew his attention to the entrance tunnel leading outside.

Two shabby, scruffy-looking locals stood near a crate of skooma paraphernalia they’d apparently just dropped on the ground. They were both armed with knives and batons, glaring at the bloody scene in anger rather than fear. One of them pointed at Lloyd.

“The hell you doin in our smugglin shaft, Rolsen?” the Altmer outlaw said in a vaguely familiar lower-class accent. His buddy, who looked more familiar, pulled out a baton menacingly.

Just as the human was about to answer, another, much more chilling voice drew both his and Tammaeroth’s attention to the longer shaft from whence they’d come. The odor of vinegar and detergent filled the air.

“It’s playtime!” the Dark Seducer who’d attacked them earlier hissed while hefting an Alindor City guard’s mace.


	11. Delayed Exit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a bit of a struggle, they at least manage to get out of Alindor city limits.
> 
> They haven’t truly escaped yet. The story is just getting started.

The local thug who’d brandished a baton earlier acted first. “You rat bastard, you’re bringin demons into our sewers!” the man yelled at Lloyd, causing both Tammaeroth and the Dark Seducer to tut their tongues in offense. With that, the man immediately pulled a knife with his free hand and flung it at the Seducer.

The hostile daedra narrowly dodged the projectile, rushing forward to meet the hefty high elf head on. They both swung their impact weapons at each other, but the Seducer was too fast, and she murdered the outlaw with a single blow to the head.

His friend went for Lloyd instead, swinging so wide that the human was able to knock the blow away with an axe. Lloyd then held his free hand up to caution the Altmer thug. “This isn’t what it looks like!” the human protested as the two daedra behind him clashed. Pain shot through Lloyd’s arm again as the outlaw pulled a knife and sliced a thin, narrow cut along the side of the sorcerer’s hand. “Ow, you son of a bitch, let me explain!” Lloyd yelled while parrying another baton swing.

“I’ve seen enough!” the outlaw said while swinging wildly, “and you’ve seen too much!”

The sight of broken weapons across from them drew Lloyd’s attention, at least latently, to his companion. A broken mace skidded across the floor, and his peripheral vision picked up the image of two daedra fighting for control of a single sword. Not wanting to let the fight grow too complicated, Lloyd decided to escalate things with the thug whom he vaguely recognized as some smuggler he may or may not have worked with.

A conjured ward stopped the outlaw’s stab attempt just as the blade was two centimeters from Lloyd’s stomach. The outlaw hesitated, apparently surprised by the way his hand was held back by the blue wall of energy. “I’m not the one who escalated this,” Lloyd said while punching the outlaw flush on the chin. “Ow, damnit!” he grunted thereafter when he realized that he’d decked the guy with his cut hand, causing a little more blood to seep out.

The Altmer outlaw hit the ground like a rock, and Lloyd swiftly disarmed the guy of everything and tossed all the weapons into the sludge pits surrounding the atrium’s walkway. The sound of a large sword also sticking into the sludge caught his attention firmly.

Tammaeroth and the Seducer had locked arms, clinching as they each attempted to slam the other on the ground. In a flash, the Seducer raised her boot and stomped on Tammaeroth’s foot thunderously. The floor tile which the friendly Dremora had been standing on shattered from the force of the cheap shot, and Tammaeroth’s own boot audibly dented. The split second in which she hissed in pain was enough for the Seducer to hip toss her hard into a stone chair. The solid piece of furniture broke into pieces, sending up dust as his only ally left in the world coughed and rolled over.

“Hey!” Lloyd yelled, preparing to cast a spell at the Seducer. Before he could react, what appeared to be a sludge monster leapt out from the murky muck and grabbed ahold of him, tearing at his clothes and throwing him to the ground. He looked up to see the second of the two hostile Dremora, the one who’d been thrown into the sludge. It walked toward him slowly, trying to pull some sort of a power play.

The Seducer walked over Tammaeroth with enough swag to fill the whole atrium, standing with a foot on either side of the downed Dremora’s back. “Tammaeroth!” the Seducer yelled mockingly, causing Lloyd’s eyes to shoot open like saucers when he realized that the two knew each other. “Oblivion’s biggest loser scores another defeat!” the Seducer laughed in a tone so snide that even a humble temple healer wouldn’t have resisted the urge to hit her.

“Come here, you!” the sludge-covered Dremora man growled at Lloyd, beckoning him to get up. He seemed to expect a scared little human, so the sorcerer played it up.

“Please don’t hurt me!” Lloyd begged in the language of the Dremora themselves, holding his hand out defensively while scooting back.

The Seducer squatted down and pulled Tammaeroth’s head back, bending the other woman’s body painfully. “He’s begging, he’s begging!” the Seducer taunted like a psychopath. The Dremora man, however, stopped laughing.

“Wait,” the Dremora male said, “how do you know our language-“

The demonic man’s sentence was cut off when Lloyd cast entropy again, shocking the hostile Dremora as the bolts of energy wrapped over, around, and inside out. The cut on Lloyd’s hand healed and sealed itself, giving him enough of a boost to sprint and tackle the Dremora hard. The impact of the demon’s metal armor hurt, but the lingering effects of the entropy handled that while Lloyd slammed the enemy daedra to the ground. Too shocked and humiliated by having a mortal overpower him, the Dremora thrashed ineffectively while Lloyd twisted him into a wrestling hold.

The Seducer, for her part, wasn’t so easily distracted, pulling even harder on Tammaeroth’s head. The friendly Dremora wouldn’t be so easily beaten a second time, though, and slid her knees beneath her own body weight to stand on shaky legs. Lloyd tried to intervene, but his own daedric opponent grabbed him by the ankle and dragged him across the tile floor. He was able to see Tammaeroth stand up with the Seducer clinging to her back just before his opponent threw him across the walkway.

The shadow of a body flying toward him warned him to roll, and he narrowly avoided heaving his head stomped in. Another conjured ward stopped the Dremora from hitting him, and Lloyd pushed through the magical barrier to grab the demonic man by the arm.

“You think you can match me? Foolish mortal!” the demon laughed, though he was soon grunting with fury when he realized that Lloyd wasn’t simply a foppish, soft-hearted spellcaster. “You cannot contain me!” the Dremora yelled, more in embarrassment than rage, as Lloyd did exactly that. Swift and surgical, the human put the demon into a half-nelson, kicked his legs out from under him, and threw him into the sludge pits again. “Burrr!” the Dremora grunted as he splashed around.

A crash echoed in the atrium, and Lloyd spun around to see, at the far end, the Seducer crashing through the debris of another broken stone chair. “Yeah!” he yelled while pumping his fist in the air, watching Tammaeroth limp toward her while removing her own dented boot. Without thinking, he began to cast his healing spell, however weak it was, toward her foot. Unfortunately, he was a poor healer at such a distance and without a staff, and much of the spell’s power bled out into the air without his companion noticing. Bones snapped back into place in her foot, catching Tammaeroth by surprise and causing her to wince. Ever the opportunist, the Seducer swept Tammaeroth’s legs out from under her in that split second and tripped her into the sludge, much like the hostile Dremora. The heavy armor of their caste weighed them both down, granting the Seducer a few seconds to recover.

“You got lucky, bitch,” the Seducer wheezed, stretching her back and shaking dust out of her helmet.

Adrenaline pumping, Lloyd grabbed his axe from the ground and charged, swinging fast but not fast enough. The Seducer stuck her hand out and grabbed the shaft, shocking the hell out of him; Lloyd had knocked around some big guys back when he was a guard, yet the Seducer easily snatched the axe from his hand as if her were a child. To his relief - or maybe chagrin - she tossed it away and approached him armed with her bare hands.

The Seducer straightened up her back to stare down at him. “You,” she snarled as he began to back away.

“Ahem. Hi,” he replied nervously while preparing his ward.

She was too fast, though, and she caught him by the wrists. The Seducer wasn’t quite as strong as him, but she was just strong enough to hold his hands apart and prevent him from casting. Rather than struggle out of her clutches and risk being hit, he let her hold on to him and tried to play innocent. “I notice that you smell much better. Quite a step up from the unfortunate mess you found yourself in a little while ago,” he said in the most unassuming, pretend dumb voice he could muster.

Her arrogant sneer sank into an outright angry glare. “I crawled out that latrine and dunked myself in a vat of laundry chemicals,” she snarled at him.

“I can’t imagine that being good for one’s skin,” he said, stalling her as long as possible, but he was running out of ideas. And even worse, she didn’t appreciate his sense of humor.

She pulled him so close that she was close enough to bite his nose had she wanted. “It’s probably even worse for the intestines,” she whispered threateningly. “Guess which one of us has to suck it down and find out.” She then kneed him in the balls so fast that he initially didn’t know what had happened.

“Gah!” he gasped, falling to a kneeling position. She twisted his wrists and pulled his arms up, which didn’t hurt so bad, but he oversold it to stall her even more. She took a deep, ecstatic breath, taking joy in the way she’d dropped him so quickly.

“Nurana!”

The Seducer threw Lloyd to the ground and spun around on cue, turning to meet a challenger who was near. From his spot on the ground, Lloyd ignored the pain in his groin long enough to see Tammaeroth covered in sludge, missing one boot, and lunging right at the Dark Seducer.

“Ready for round three - argh rrrr!” the Seducer named Nurana said and then grunted as the two of them crashed into each other.

This time, Nurana’s attempted cheap shots didn’t work; every attempted eye poke, throat jab, and kneecap kick was met by the fanatical rage of Tammaeroth as she slowly overwhelmed Nurana. In a juxtaposition of their previous fight, the Dremora eventually pummeled the Seducer to the ground, straddling and beating her senseless in a furious ass whooping beyond even the worst that Lloyd had broken up at Daggerfall’s seediest bars on night shift guard duty. Despite the throbbing pain in his groin, he still cheered for Tammaeroth when her former tormented cried out for mercy.

Sticky mud sloshed around as the male Dremora climbed out of the sludge pits again, brandishing a knife he’d somehow fished out of the stuff. Lloyd grit his teeth and forced himself to stand, picking up a baton from the Altmer outlaw corpse and facing down the enemy that just wouldn’t go away. The two men squared off, but the sign of movement below the sludge finally granted the human the idea he’d been hoping for.

Rather than swinging full throttle, Lloyd simply extended his arm and used the baton to give the enemy Dremora a hard push. The force was such that he dropped the baton in the process, but the tactic succeeded: the Dremora stumbled backward toward the bubbling mass, flailing its arms around to keep it balanced. All that effort was for naught when the bubbling mass burst to the surface and swallows his arm.

“Aaaaaahhhhh!” the Dremora male yelled, not from pain but from fear when it realized that a giant salamander had swallowed his arm beyond the elbow. The race’s claims of fearlessness were once again refuted at the demonic scream that was emitted when the amphibious monster broke the metal bracer and actually bit the Dremora’s arm clean off of his body. A second giant salamander chomped down on the Dremora’s leg and brought the demonic man down. “Noooooo!” was the hostile Dremora’s last words as he was dragged beneath the surface, still gargling into the sludge as he was eaten alive and drowned at the same time.

“Tammaeroth, we have to go!” Lloyd shouted as the gruesome scene played out in the muck. He turned to see her still beating the ever-loving shit out Nurana, who’d reverted into the fetal position. He ran over to them and tried to shake his companion to her senses. “Come on, we don’t need any more delays-“

She turned a quarter of the way around and shook him off of her. “Wait, Lloyd!” she snapped at him, not yet finished with her revenge.

He hit the ground hard and rolled, sitting up to find half the atrium ablaze. The fireballs cast by the high elf cultist earlier had ignited many of the vines growing up the walls of the enclosed space, heating up the large room. More unseen muck monsters began to stir, perhaps smelling the dead Dremora warrior sinking into their rank domicile. They’d clearly outstayed their welcome.

More determined now, Lloyd got back up and wrapped his arms around her, holding close to avoid being shoved or hit. “Please, this is our chance. We can’t let these cretins delay us any longer!”

Though she let him gradually pull her off of her pinned opponent, she continued to hold her arms out in a ‘come at me’ pose at Nurana, who was absolutely motionless in a pool of her own blood. “Talk all the trash you want to now!” Tammaeroth yelled. “Ptuh!” she spat on Nurana’s body for the utmost disrespect.

With more effort than he’d expended in the fight, Lloyd managed to pull Tammaeroth away. He couldn’t blame her recalcitrance given the excellent vengeance she’d pulled off, but the burning vines and moans from the surviving Altmer thug who appeared to be waking up signaled that it was time to leave. When he’d finally convinced her to dump everything behind and flee with him, the entrance tunnel was alight due to the fire burning inside.

Outside, the burst into the open fields to the east of Alindor. At the exact moment in which they exited the sewage pipe pouring out, a noise spooked Tammaeroth enough to jump on Lloyd and cover him; they both hit the muddy grass hard. The sound of arrows dinging on metal and mud caused him to throw up his ward again, and he struggled against her effort to keep him face first on the ground.

“It will hold for a few seconds, let me up!” he shouted at her, and rather than taking offense at his tone, she thankfully had the sense to get off of him and pull him to his feet.

On instinct, the two of them ran into the darkness of the fields, but Lloyd turned back to catch a glimpse of three figures standing on top of the drainage pipe poking out from the hills below the city walls.

Druinald, the justiciar who’d first arrested Lloyd at the guild, was standing with his arms folded behind his back. Two archers from the city guard flanked him, holding their fire once the ward was up. They just stared at the pair, watching until Lloyd and Tammaeroth disappeared into the darkness of the foothills.


	12. Catching Their Breath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Circumstance creates strange alliances at times. In this particular instance, building team trust takes time.

For what felt like more than an hour, Lloyd and Tammaeroth ran eastward into the wilderness. Grassy fields gave way to foothills which gave way to forest. At first, the distant light pollution of Alindor provided just enough light for the pair to avoid tripping on rocks and stepping in holes. Eventually, the grand city disappeared from view and gave way to actual starlight, which ironically provided much better visibility in the dark of night. The sparkling reflection of the moon on a creek far ahead guided them to a water source. After running for so long and without any supplies, the latent sound of the bubbling creek beckoned to them even at its considerable distance.

The two of them gradually slowed down from a run to a jog to a walk. Despite her fitness, Tammaeroth was rather winded from all the armor she was wearing; that she’d managed to run fo so long without stopping at all was a feat in and of itself.

Lloyd tried to talk, but his mouth was too dry at first, and he shook her shoulder as they shambled toward the water source. “Hey,” he panted, “we’ve lost them. You can remove your gear if you want.”

She shook her head without even considering it. “No. Enemies abound.”

“Here.” He conjured his candlelight again, letting the orb float around them. “We’ll have enough time for you to suit up again.”

“No,” she repeated.

“Look, you’re going to get sick if you can’t rest and cool off. I’ve got your back.”

“No,” she said like a broken record. When the shimmering current of the creek became visible upon their approach, however, she started removing her chestplate and pauldrons. “Okay,” she said of her own accord.

He ended up holding a great deal of her armor on their final approach. The daedric armor was lighter than steel, but Lloyd still didn’t envy her for having run in it. The two of them looked and felt like a mess when they finally reached the creek itself. Once their feet were moving over the tiny smooth stones on the creek side, they both fell to their knees and crawled the rest of the distance to the water. They both drank greedily, gorging themselves and then wiping themselves down the best they could. Lloyd’s hair, beard, and robes smelled like dirt, and Tammaeroth’s cloth underclothes were greasy from the sludge pit.

Once they’d rested up a bit, they just sat and looked at the sky. “Thank you...so much,” he said, garnering yet another confused look from her. “I think you saved my life.”

She didn’t seem to understand his gratitude. “Welcome,” she replied awkwardly, as if pleasantry was unfamiliar to her.

Both of them looked down at the water. “We have a lot to consider,” he said. She was either so tired or so overwhelmed that she only nodded. “Tonight has been fast paced, to say the least. I hope we can slow down a bit and try to figure out what’s going on.”

“We can’t,” she said, though her tone was one of resignation as if she didn’t mean what she was saying. “We need to keep moving.”

“Tammaeroth, you said that the place you want me to go - this opening through Oblivion - is in a spot which is a week’s worth of travel away. Surely we must be able to spare a few minutes.” She stared at him skeptically, which was surprising given her seeming resignation a moment before. “Look...it makes sense not to rush. I know how the Justiciars operate. They won’t come after us immediately because they have all transportation lines to their island under control. They’ll likely have a warrant for my arrest sent to other cities by the morning, and then fall into a ‘lay and wait’ strategy. It’s extremely unlikely that they’ll comb the forest for us with search parties and hounds. Laying low for a while could be a better way to deceive them...does that make sense?”

That weird defensive manner he’d seen before, hovering in her expression and posture, radiated from her again. Her reaction made no sense to him since she certainly had an advantage over him alone and in the wilderness, yet she remained reserved as if she were the one whose trust hadn’t yet been earned. “Very well...you know the island,” she eventually conceded. “I’ll trust you to lead us the right way for now.”

“Good, it makes me happy to hear that. I trust you without question based on what you did for me. But please understand that I’m putting my trust in you without knowing much of your motives. I’m sure you can understand my curiosity, and my desire to ask you again, now that we aren’t running for our lives.”

At the notion of more questioning, she bristled. “You said we need to talk...you...we need to find your friend. You said you had a friend who can help. That’s what we need right now.”

“And I’m going to lead us there, don’t worry; I have no incentive to slow down our escape, do I?” he asked. She pursed her lips and stared at him, though without the standoffish tension in her eyes. “So would you be kind enough to indulge me for just a few moments before we begin planning our escape in earnest? Just to put my mind at ease and help me focus on the mission?”

Tension which had once been latent now vaporized, though its replacement wasn’t necessarily comfort. Her shoulders relaxed and her face softened, but she exuded an almost transactional manner which seemed so forced that it had to be a defense mechanism rather than her genuine nature.

“Conjure my sword back for me,” she said with renewed confidence, “and I’ll permit more questions.”

He grinned and felt reenergized by her engagement. “Of course - I’ll have it right up!” He sat cross legged and retraced her footsteps into Oblivion again, not seeing so much as feeling the path she’d taken to get there from the skein she’d spoken of. Her greatsword materialized after a minute or so of concentration, scabbard and all. “There, as good as new,” he said, though she didn’t pay much attention and snatched her weapon up as if there was already a fight on its way. It took him a few seconds to realize that she’d grabbed her sword in order to get it away from him.

A quiet moment passed between them, and when he patiently waited for her to speak, she put her sword back down. Her gaze drifted downward from his to the ground beside him, exuding - alongside her lowered shoulders - a sense of guilt. At least she was starting to trust him if she judged her own defensiveness as a reason for guilt.

He tried to use flattery to pull her back into her comfort zone. “I’m glad you remembered that; we’ll need you ready to act if we’re to survive out here. Hermaeus Mora sent the right daedra for this job considering everything we’re facing.” Thankfully, she brought herself to look directly at him again, and he decided to push for as much information as he could. “Is it okay if I ask you more about the motives of these people coming after me?”

“Very well,” she replied. For the first time, her tone of voice (almost) sounded polite, and she even sheathed her sword again.

“Good, thank you. What I’d like to know, if you’re aware of this, is why the Justiciars targeted me and not anybody else in the guild. I’m not the only sorcerer there.”

“The answer to this question is the same as it was before: your checkout list at the library is too long for the time you’ve been here. The content itself is enough to arouse their suspicion, and there are others on their watch list.”

“How many others?”

“I don’t know, Lloyd. I only know that you went from being on the watch list to the wanted list when they noticed how rapidly you finish books. There’s no deeper mystery than that.”

“How do you know? Did you contact the Justiciars?”

“No,” she replied tersely.

“Did Hermaeus Mora tell you this?”

“No, not direct-“ Tammaeroth cut her sentence short and bit her lip.

Her whole demeanor was surprisingly cute: armed and dangerous, stained in the blood of her enemies, yet shy when she realized that she’d divulged more information than she was comfortable with. Still, he didn’t let her linger in that state and pretended that he didn’t hear what she’d said. “And those wackos, the people devoted to Stendarr. Are you sure they want to kill me for the same reasons that the Justiciars want to arrest me?” he asked.

“Yes. Those people are disorganized, most of them young and stupid, but they have members working in law enforcement here. They have access to your name as well as that of anybody else under surveillance.”

“And those other daedra...you said you don’t know why they’re after me. But before tonight, did you know about them? In advance? Or did you not know of them until now?”

“I had an idea that others from our ranks would be after you, but I know no more than that.”

“Alright. Well, Tammaeroth, we have another complication: those smugglers. I know about them...are you familiar with them?”

Her shoulders picked back up, and she leaned closer to him. Her attention now focused, she rapidly pulled herself out of her previous shyness. “No, I have no idea who they are. Who are they? Can they threaten my mission?” she asked with keen interest. He scooted closer too, almost feeling as if he wasn’t entirely alone in the world anymore.

“It’s possible. I worked with them once - they smuggled banned books for me, so my name is likely on their list too. They’re the ones who took me through those tunnels and showed me the way after I’d bought from them a few times.”

“How many of them are there?” she asked urgently, far too urgently considering the fact that they were alone and far from any danger.

“Oh...well, there are these two brothers at the head - the Highus Brothers. They have four cousins who work with them. Everyone else who runs drugs and the like for them is just hired temporarily from the slums and fed minimal info-“

“Lloyd, how many are there?”

“Twenty, maybe,” he replied, and she leaned back in relief.

“And how far is their reach?”

“It stops at my friend’s town,” he said to a quizzical look from her. “The safe place I mentioned, the place that we can-“

“I remember, Lloyd.”

“Right, right. It’s a town called Rellenthil. Those smugglers don’t operate that far out, and probably not in the wilderness out here. Once it’s daylight, we need to follow this creek northeast for a day and camp when it bends back to the southeast. Then on the second day, keep going straight north from the bend, then we curve west around the mountains we’ll reach. We can hit Alchemy’s residence by nightfall.” Tammaeroth squinted at him as if to ask for clarification. “Alchemy is my friend’s name, not alchemy as in the craft. She’s very discreet, plus she owes me a big favor, so she can take us in and help us get on our way.”

Tammaeroth looked down and shook her head. “If she isn’t a sorcerer, she may be frightened by me. If she is frightened by me, she may report you to the authorities. If she threatens my mission, then I’ll-“

“No, Alchemy would never do that.”

“See to it that she doesn’t.” For a few seconds, Tammaeroth grew rather serious. When Lloyd returned the quizzical look she’d given him so many times, however, she wrung her wrists like a security blanket in front of her. How a being so powerful could feel so uneasy when chatting with a mortal was a mystery that drove him mad. “What?” she asked.

He smiled but looked away so as not to overwhelm her. “You’re extremely devoted to your mission.”

Her face became a stage for emotional transition that even Alchemy would admire. Tammaeroth went from serious to withdrawn to curious to exposed in a matter of moments. “I honor my lord by escorting you,” she said, her echoing, demonically harmonized voice now tinged with a hint of nervousness.

“You’re an honorable person, Tammaeroth, and I’m glad to have met you,” he said, causing her to shrink in her spot next to him. He acted as if he didn’t notice. “But I wonder...what led you here? You know, or seem to know, that I’m a wanderer who seeks to read as much as I can. You also know that, with my expulsion from Alindor, I’m a penniless mage with only the clothes on my back and the will to live. Why would you accept a mission to evacuate such a person with no directive thereafter?”

Her lips opened as if she wanted to ask a wh-question, but she stopped herself. Unable to look away due to her confusion at his interest, she just stared at him with those big eyes of hers. Even with sharp teeth, she looked almost soft when she wasn’t glaring at him. The amount of transitions her feelings could go through was astounding, and certainly unexpected for a being considered a demon by most of the general population, and he found himself as curious as she was.

Once she realized that she’d been staring at him, she shook her head again as if snapping herself out of a daze. “I’m...a daedra. There is no accepting a mission or rejecting it. My lord commands, and I obey.”

“Alright. But from what I’ve read, our mortal scholars seem convinced that Dremora, as a race, possess a level of free will beyond other daedra. And I’m going to guess - correct me if I’m wrong here - that you’re freer than the average Dremora too. That you’re even willing to speak to me cordially shows that you can exercise a great deal of choice because the most common stereotype is that your fellows will be rude and dismissive to my fellows. Plus, few of your race serve Hermaeus Mora, and usually, the grey-skinned clans serve Mehrunes Dagon. So you must have chosen...”

Lloyd stopped. As he was going on and on, Tammaeroth began to change even more. Like an escaped criminal under a magical spotlight, her body language folded in on herself, and she seemed to shrink even more in her spot. Strands of her hair fell in front of her face as she pretended to look at the creek, and she angled her head to hide part of her face behind her silky, jet black locks. The way she licked her lips seemed more nervous than sultry, and it was now Lloyd’s turn to feel the stab of guilt in his chest.

“Tammaeroth...I’m sorry,” he said, nearly laughing when her personality flipped again. The sound of an apology perplexed her so much that she made eye contact with him again. “I’m not making fun. I honestly didn’t realize that I was prying. You’ve been very brave, and a trusted comrade even if I met you tonight. It wasn’t my intention to make you feel scrutinized, and I hope I can help you return to your comfort zone.”

Though she continued sitting defensively, his words seemed to work on some level, and she finally spoke without dodging the topic. “Why do you talk like this?” she asked. Her blunt question returned at least enough of a sense of power for her to turn to face him as they sat.

“It’s kind of dumb, but I once took a workshop in Orsinium on open communication and conflict resolution. If somebody can get a room full of orcs to stop fighting and talk about feelings, then they probably know a thing or two about speaking with sincerity and respect.”

Then, the most amazing thing happened. From confusion, the animated Dremora’s face transitioned to that expression when she thought he was a smart guy saying stupid things to...amusement. The faintest hint of a smile, almost invisible in the dark of night, crept onto one side of her thick lips. Her brows relaxed, and she seemed to actually enjoy herself.

“It’s not dumb,” she said while looking down shyly. “And...thanks. I’m glad to have met you, too.” After switching between staring at her lap, then at him, and then at her lap, she regained her confidence in the conversation. “We must take to the trees and sleep in shifts. You sleep first; I’ll wake you when it’s my turn.”

“That’s an excellent idea.”

She pointed at a particularly high tree behind him. “That one there. It’s too high for predators to climb or for other mortals to notice us, and the foliage is nice and thick. We can worry about food in the morning.”

Until dawn, the pair was able to rest in the branches of the tree undisturbed. Little did they know that things were only beginning.


	13. Eating Food and Pulling Teeth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the first day of their run from the law, the pair engage in their first normal conversation over food. Normal conversation with a dremora proves to be tougher than pulling teeth.

At least three times during the night, Lloyd was awoken by the sound of rustling leaves and grinding stones as Tammaeroth flew off the proverbial handle at any perceived threat. He’d eventually rested a reasonable enough amount of time for him to take a shift of keeping watch, though she only agreed after much goading on his part. By the time the sun had risen and she began to stir in her perch, he’d managed to inspect the vegetation in the immediate area for edible items. Most of the wildlife had left them alone after Tammaeroth had somehow killed two wolves, decapitated them, put their heads on sticks, and planted the sticks at the banks of the creek as a warning all without waking him up a fourth time. As much as he appreciated her enthusiasm for marking their territory, he had to admit that the mounted animal heads dampened his appetite for a few hours.

The early morning sun brought new warmth, allowing him to start a fire and bake a few shoots and tubers on flat rocks he’d heated up. The smell, as well as the sunlight, eventually caused Tammaeroth to open her eyes. Draped over a thick branch on her stomach, she looked like a Blackmarsh sloth as she struggled to wake up. By the time she’d ambled down to his spot and knelt next to him, she seemed mostly awake.

“Good morning! This stuff is almost ready,” he said while rolling the singed tubers around with a stick.

Her eyes fixated on him rather than what he was cooking. “We’re both awake; we need to start moving.”

He smiled at her focus even when he didn’t agree. “It’s healthier to sit down and wake up gradually; breakfast is a great time for us to do just that. Here.” He picked up pieces of his robe’s left sleeve, which he’d also ripped off and washed, as a sort of napkin to serve her a portion of their food on. “Isn’t it nice to sit and relax after a night like that?”

All of a sudden, she grabbed him by the shoulder and squeezed painfully tight, though she seemed merely serious rather than aggressive. “Lloyd, we need to go! How can you stall our departure - you promised last night not to leave my sight!”

“I’m not leaving your sight,” he chuckled, causing her to arch her head back in surprise at the sound. “I keep my promises. In fact, I’m just sitting here with you.”

“But we need to leave!”

“Tammaeroth, you agreed that I know this island, right?”

“Yes,” she replied without giving the matter any thought.

“So trust me. I’ve given you no reason to distrust me so far, have I?”

“No, you’ve been obedient,” she replied, looking at him in shock again when he chuckled at the choice of words.

“Good. I trust you with my life...literally. So trust me when I say that, out here, there’s absolutely nobody looking for us. Nobody is coming for us. They’ll wait for us to show ourselves. Will that passage through Oblivion and back out, the one near Shimmerene, stay there?”

“Yes, my lord has closed it and hidden it. It will open again only when you approach it, and it will be clear for all to see.”

“Excellent! Good to hear. So, in the meantime...” He used the pieces of his torn sleeve like napkins to offer her portion of the singed vegetation. “...we may as well slow down and eat well, right?”

For a few moments, her eyes darted between him and the food. Visibly considering his offer to sit and eat, she looked curiously conflicted by the simple question. The hardness which she’d displayed the previous night was gone, though, and she almost looked at ease.

Finally, she accepted the food and sat down next to him, even refraining from her previous tendency to constantly look over her shoulder for sneak attacks.

“Hey, this is nice, isn’t it?” he asked as they ate. “It’s not the tastiest food out there, but at least it’s sanitary.”

She shook her head at him. “It’s food; it doesn’t need to have a specific taste,” she said with a mouth full of food, forcing him to stifle a polite laugh again.

He smiled while watching her eat. “Maybe this isn’t the best time - I don’t want to pine over things we don’t have - but surely you must have a favorite food which you’d rather eat?”

She shook her head again. “It’s just fuel. It’s the curse of these fleshy constructs the vestige is bound to.”

“That’s an interesting view. You know, I’ve read a lot about this, but I’ve never known...do you have a favorite food in Oblivion?” She accidentally bit her tongue and grunted in shock at his question. “I’m sorry, was my question that bad?” he joked.

Holding her hand up to wave ‘no,’ she took a moment to recover and swallow without chewing. “It’s not bad, but I don’t understand. You’ve read a lot about my favorite food?”

“No, I didn’t mean...my question was bad. What I mean is that I’ve read a lot about daedric biology, a whole lot of baseless speculation, but I don’t know how life functions for you. Do you eat regularly like we do? Do you need to eat?”

She actually stopped eating to regard him as if he were speaking another language. “Wha...you...you’re asking about eating? You...but...you’re supposed to read enough about Oblivion. That’s why you were notice-“ When she stopped herself and looked down shyly at her food, he knew she’d almost entered normal conversation again. He could feel those imaginary doors closing around him as she tried to stall him, and as much as he wanted to respect her space, his curiosity began to overtake him. The way she allowed her eyes to raise back up to his implied that she wanted to talk, and maybe even wished he would push her a little more, but he felt like he was walking on ice to avoid pushing her too hard.

Instead of cornering her into talking about her mission, he tried to be delicate and avoid asking about who’d noticed him. “I do read a lot, yes; you’ve probably guessed by now that I don’t fear daedra. After all, you told me that your mission involves taking me through a rift into Oblivion. Most other mortals would have tried to escape you at that exact second, don’t you agree?”

“I don’t agree - this is my mission!” she said, getting worked up for a brief few seconds. She almost reached to grab ahold of him again, but when she saw his almost amused smile, she calmed down. “What I mean is...I agree that others would have run away. But I don’t agree with running away. My mission...is...mortal...Lloyd, you must continue to cooperate.”

He laughed politely again, causing her the same sort of surprised confusion, but less than before. “And I will. I keep my promises. I just want to understand whether you eat or not; I’m fascinated by that. Supposedly, daedra are immortal. But daedra also have hearts, and I’d assume lungs since I once killed an unbound scamp with a chokehold.” Her face softened as if she were the one curious. “It was when I was first getting started with magic as a teen. I had no idea what I was doing.” She hummed at him, nodding her head in respect at the mention at having killed something - an act that, ironically, he wasn’t fond of. He smiled all the same, and to his joy, she sat more comfortably and started to eat again while looking at him expectantly. “Anyway, since daedra have organs, and since they can die from violence, I’ve always wondered: can daedra starve? Is eating a necessity? You told me that you think food is only fuel, so you have opinions about food. You also told me that it’s a necessity for you on Mundus.”

Bipolar to the max, she paused and froze up, looking shy again. “I said that?”

“Yes, you told me last night. Remember?”

“I said that food and water would be an issue when we travel because you need to...” She stopped herself and let her mouth fall open gently. “I did tell you that. I remember.”

“Indeed.”

“But I...we aren’t supposed to talk to you about that.”

“To me, or to mortals in general?”

“Mortals in general,” she replied.

“So daedra aren’t supposed to talk to mortals about your biology?”

She took another bite of food and chewed slowly to stall him. He waited patiently, eating as well and occasionally catching her gaze as she finished. She was definitely uncomfortable, but less so than the previous night. “We’re not supposed to talk to you in general. And especially not about ourselves.”

“Who made that rule?”

“Well, it’s...” This time when she paused, she seemed to legitimately ponder his question rather than dodge it. “I don’t know. Nobody. It’s not talked about, we just know that.”

“Do you know innately from the instinct imbued in you by the Chaotic Creatia, or is this like a social contract?”

“Yes...no...Lloyd, I don’t know. I just know that I know but I don’t know how I know. It’s just not what we do.”

“But we trust each other, right?”

“Ack! Arr,” she hacked, choking on her food. He patted her on the back, helping her cough out whatever she’d choked on. “What...why do you talk like this?”

“It’s open communication. If a team is to succeed, it’s extremely helpful. We gain nothing by hiding info from each other. I’m not shy to say that I respect anybody who takes a combustible fireball for me.”

Flattery seemed to work well, and her ego was stroked enough for her to clear her throat and look directly at him again. “Thank,” she replied, still slightly awkward when exchanging kind words. “I trust you not to disobey, but I’m worried that when you see Oblivion, you might be afraid and change your mind.”

“I won’t. You’ll see. But for now, just tell me. I’m different from other humans because I don’t fear you; you’re different from other dremora because you don’t mock me as worthless. Surely this is a situation where you can tell me this small detail about your people.”

The great deal of hesitation she’d previously possessed was gone. Even when she watched him eat with a hint of suspicion written into her face, her body language was far more open than it had been. Her fingers played with her food, perhaps subconsciously, and what surely had to be a complicated mental process played out. He didn’t envy her for the conflict she might have felt, but he also felt he deserved at least a few answers for his cooperation so far.

In the end, she made a few baby steps of progress toward friendly interaction.

“Yes, our bodies need to eat. Our organs need to be supported...they’re like yours. We aren’t tied to them, but they’re like yours.”

Delighted that she was answering, he forced himself to wait a few moments and pretend to be casual; if he showed her how excited he was to learn a little more, he might have freaked her out. “Fascinating. So you aren’t tied to your bodies, as in, your soul can get a new one?”

“Vestige, not soul. We are our vestiges; our bodies can be reformed. We don’t worry about our bodies as much as a mortal because your body you have now, this,” she said while waving to his form, “is the only one you have; if you lose it, you leave Mundus and go to Aetherius. This,” she said while waving to herself, “is one of many. I don’t enjoy dying, but it isn’t the end, so I don’t care about food or drink. If a daedra does, then they’re not normal.”

Nodding and memorizing what she said, he began to reconcile the new information with myths he’d read. “That’s incredible...thanks for telling me, Tammaeroth.”

“Welcomes,” she said, averting her gaze from him again. If he wasn’t mistaken, her mouth softened from her usual scowl into, if not a smile, a neutral sort of position.

“I’m going to change your mind about food by the way,” he chuckled.

This time, she did squint at him again. “You’ll what?” she asked curiously.

He nodded and finished his food. “I’ll change your mind. Alchemy has to let us stay for at least a little while - she owes me. And when we eat at her place, we can try some better food. Maybe you’ll even taste some which you’ll enjoy tasting.”

Holding on to the rest of her food, she stared at him in unexplained disbelief. The notion of eating food because it tasted better than other food didn’t seem new to her so much as foreign. She remained silent, though, staring down at the food and eventually finishing it, having exhausted her energy for speech that didn’t involve battle shouts for the time being. He let her eat in leave, content to sit at the creek and try to think about what exactly he’d tell Alchemy when he showed up with a daedra on the doorstep.


	14. Fun Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone has to get used to accepting complements.
> 
> It’s not filler, it’s fluff.

As the two of them prepared to begin walking northeast, they gathered up what few belongings they had: Tammaeroth’s gear, the torn fabric from Lloyd’s robe sleeve, berries he’d collected from the area, and rocks in case they were harassed by squirrels. When Tammaeroth began to don all her armor, Lloyd stopped her.

“That’s going to weigh you down if we march for a day.”

“Enemies abound,” she said while almost ignoring him.

“Let’s say that’s true: you won’t help yourself by marching in that and getting fatigued.”

“I need my armor, Lloyd. I can’t allow any threats to stand in my way.”

She continued suiting up, too focused to even look at him. He found her single-mindedness to be a possible weakness, as strong as she was. “If you need to protect me, then it may make sense to let me wear some of your armor for now,” he said. Her interest was piqued enough for her to stop and look at him. “It will relieve you of some of your burden and also help you keep me alive - which you seem very intent on.”

“No,” she said at first, stubborn as a mule when it came to her mission. Once she paused and continued thinking about it, though, she relented. “Okay.”

Over the next few minutes, they played an interesting game of mix and match with her wicked armor. Although Tammaeroth was physically stronger than Lloyd was, he was still larger than her (as well as shaped differently for obvious reasons). Which pieces of her gear would fit him, if any, was a mystery they couldn’t quite guess by looking. Her chestplate wouldn’t fit his dimensions, of course, but they did try and fail with her pauldrons and gauntlets, finding that both items were too small for him. Her helmet fit on him, though it felt uncomfortably snug, and her girdle and bracers were of adjustable size. With her armor divvied up, they finally began the long hike northeast.

For a good few hours, they marched in silence. Tammaeroth was an excellent travel partner in that she intuitively knew when to speed up, when to slow down, and when to remain quiet during their trek. Her military gait brought back long lost memories to Lloyd, and though he meandered a few times in the first hour, he eventually fell into lockstep with her. Before either of them had noticed, the sun reached its zenith and they’d barely even spoken.

Lloyd looked over to her and noticed the sweat beading on her eyebrow. In the sunlight, he had a better view of the crimson body markings decorating her dark grey skin. He’d heard the term ‘otherworldly’ used to describe the beauty of nature spirits like nereids and spriggans; in Tammaeroth’s case, the term ‘underworldly’ seemed more appropriate given her sharp features and demonic profile. Her complexion reminded him of a molten rune from the core of Nirn, elegant yet dangerous like a flame atronach. Except not setting him on fire. If he had to make a choice between her style and that of some waifish nature spirit, it would be her all the way.

“Are they tattoos or natural?” he asked before he even realized that he was prying.

Paranoid to the max, she immediately reached for her greatsword. Aggression came so easily to her, and from a mere miscommunication, she was scanning the area for enemies. He leaned away from her to avoid being knocked over or even worse.

“What!” she asked harshly while staring down every bush around them.

He held his hands out to caution her. “Wait, you think I’m talking about another-“

“Hiding will not save you now!” she hissed while cutting down the nearest bush, looking confused as hell when she realized that there wasn’t anybody hiding behind it.

“Tammaeroth, I was asking about you!”

“What?” she asked without even turning to face him.

“There’s nobody attacking us,” he tried to explain while she stalked the tree line near the creek. “I was asking about you, there’s nobody else here.”

Still gripping her sword, her shoulders loosened a bit and she turned to him. The sight of her wielding her sword while facing him made him more nervous than he’d expected, and he kept his distance. “My sentence came out wrong. I wasn’t talking about some imaginary enemy - if there were enemies, I’d clearly tell you as much.”

She glanced around, realizing that the two of them were alone in the wilderness. “Quiet again,” she said while slinging her sword back into its scabbard. Without any sort of clarification as to what had just happened, she turned to stand next to him and play off having been ready to cut an attacker in half mere seconds prior. “We should get going.” She then looked at him expectantly, taking half a step forward to see if he was ready.

He didn’t delay her. “Your vigilance is unparalleled,” was the most positive way he could frame her behavior.

“Welcomes,” she replied, none the wiser and rather content.

Though he began walking with her and even played off her overreaction, he was intent on repeating what he’d said. If anything, he just wanted to say it so he could stop thinking about it. “So I was asking about you, Tammaeroth. I really like the red markings you have. Are they tattoos, or another form of body art? Or were you born with them?”

“We’re not born at all-“ Once again, she stopped herself when she realized that she’d begun to open up. “You like my what?”

“Your coloration, I guess I could say it that way. The grey and red really go so well together that I thought perhaps you had tattoos done as a way to express yourself. But the texture...no, wrong word. The consistency, I guess? The way the red color appears is very different from tattoo ink. So then I wondered if it’s natural, but I won’t know unless I ask, right?”

She’d started squinting at him during his question, almost shaking her head in an attempt to follow what he meant. Instead of shying away, she mouthed a few words and struggled to engage in a personal discussion. “You...like...grey and red?” she asked in confusion.

Not wanting to make her uncomfortable, he tried to tone down his appreciation. “Well, all colors are nice. Right now, I’m just talking about yours in particular - you have a very distinguished look. It’s unique.”

He paused to see how she’d react and found that she at least didn’t avert her gaze and fold in on herself. What she did do was grow silent and furrow her brow ambivalently as if she didn’t know how to react. She looked from him to the creek to him again, in an honest quandary about a simple complement. He wasn’t sure whether to change the subject to spare her the ambivalence or to continue talking in order to help her feel comfortable talking about things other than her mission. On a whim, he determined to try and reach out to her one more time.

“So you said your kind aren’t born. That makes sense...I guess you arise from the Chaotic Creatia. When that happens, do you already have the cool red marks you have now?”

Her lips closed, she looked up at him without breaking away for a few seconds. Her expression was one of concern, and he had a strong feeling that she wanted to answer against some sort of demonic ban on befriending mortals. Her demeanor reminded him of a prisoner at the Daggerfall dungeon on her release day, free to leave yet anxious about leaving. She reached up and pretended to tuck a silky strand of jet black hair behind her ear despite it already being there.

“I...well...” Clearing her throat nervously, she made a few small noises and false starts before speaking out loud. “I always have these. Even when I’m reborn, these are...” Out of sheer anxiety, she couldn’t finish her sentence and just continued walking. Lloyd continued to glance at her every few seconds just to express his interest, but he didn’t poke or prod her. A few seconds later, she took a breath and let herself speak freely. “They’re natural, not tattoos. This is just what I look like.”

While she was recovering from answering a personal question, he smiled and nodded. “That’s really cool. My people don’t have anything like that; maybe just a few birthmarks. Your look is so...well, you. It just fits so well.”

Then the most curious thing happened. As they walked, her colors which he’d been admiring started to change. Not most of her skin, though; the charcoal grey color remained. What changed were her body markings. The crimson color shifted ever so slightly to a brighter shade, one that nobody would have noticed from a distance. When she phantom tucked that strand of hair behind her ear again, he couldn’t help but look down and smile wide: Tammaeroth was blushing. At least, he assumed that was how she blushed. She really wasn’t used to complements.

Never wanting to put her in too bright of a spotlight, he finally relented and changed the subject for her. “I also read that daedra are created, not born. That’s so different from us. So if you’re created without a childhood, as you are now, do you retain memories of your early life?”

In comparison to the previous topic, this one seemed far less difficult for her, and she spoke more freely. “Of course; I remember the moment in which I was created from the stuff of Oblivion, the moment before which there was no me. We don’t develop over time; we’re us immediately from creation.”

“How long ago was that for you?”

She shook her head, almost with casual confidence. “Time in Oblivion is different from time in Mundus. I could tell you that I existed from the start of the first era to the end of it, yet the amount of time and days which I experienced isn’t comparable to what mortals lived on Nirn during that period.”

“So if I asked you about your birthday, then the answer wouldn’t make sense to me? Is that a correct guess?” he asked.

She stared forward down their path, pausing before nodding. “Yes,” she said with a forced confidence that signified how resolved she was to have a normal conversation. “Yes, that’s close to how it is. In Oblivion, time is elastic. It can stretch or bunch up.”

“See, that’s interesting to hear. I always wondered how daedra could tolerate being immortal. I’m sure it would be cool for the first few centuries of life, like an elf, but after that...doesn’t working on a plane of Oblivion get old?”

“What-what? No, that isn’t possible,” she replied quite naturally. “That can’t happen.”

“Why not?” he asked.

“Because it can’t. I can...look. I can see a mortal here on Nirn once, then come back when ten years have passed for them. But it doesn’t feel that way when I’m in Oblivion. Then, even after that, there’s the issue of choice. Most of us who serve our lords faithfully don’t have free will like mortals do, and so doing the same thing day in, day out is nearly lost on them.”

“Sounds like orgrim.”

“Yes, and many of my kind are like more articulate orgrim or scamps with vocabulary. They become lost in the narrow purpose of their creation.”

“But here’s the question, Tammaeroth, and it’s a big one.”

“Huh?”

“Why are you so different from the types you just described?” he asked.

All over again, her crimson markings brightened as she blushed. The sight was so cute that he grinned but looked away to avoid making her feel shy. “That’s...it’s true, but...” She pretended to clear her throat a second time. “Lloyd, that’s not easy for me to talk about,” she said with more forced confidence. Her hand trembled while she pretended to scratch her nose.

“I respect your honesty. I hope I didn’t pry too much,” he answered.

She looked up at him only to stop herself from speaking at first. Instead, she started by waving a finger to deny what he’d thought. “It’s okay,” she said.

“Well, thank you for your patience with all my questions. You’re fun to talk to.”

This time, she didn’t quite blush even when she paused awkwardly to consider what he’d said. Eyes over the horizon, she held her head level and even lost the seriousness in her expression. “So are you,” she replied without stuttering.

They walked a little further in silence as high noon passed them by. “Are you ready to eat yet?” he asked, shaking a sleeve full of berries.

When it came to fuel, she didn’t mince words. “Yes, I want my half and some of yours,” she said, slowing down so they could drink, eat, and rest before walking for the rest of the day.


	15. Cutting Losses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another brief discussion of a chapter. A chat about their escape almost becomes a sincere discussion about loss, but like in real life, not everybody opens up so easily.

That evening, the pair settled down at the forested bend in the creek they’d been following. Having walked almost without stopping, the two of them were both satisfied with their progress even though Tammaeroth repeatedly looked northward in the direction of their destination. They’d already had to stray into the woods west of the creek bend in order to find large enough trees with sufficiently heavy branches for the two of them to sleep in, and by the time they’d built makeshift nests, they’d both reached their limit for the day.

On the forest floor beneath their perch, Lloyd was busy stabilizing skewers of rabbit meat over a fire they’d built. He wasn’t a great cook, and he’d taken his time casting cure spells on the meat in case it was contaminated, thus delaying their meal even further than the rabbit itself had when they’d been chasing it in circles for an hour. Tammaeroth’s stomach growled, and so did she.

“Don’t worry, it’s almost done,” Lloyd chucked softly while overcooking the taste right out of the meat.

For her part, Tammaeroth seemed content to sharpen her sword while staring into the fire. Even when hungry, she didn’t complain. “Good,” she replied politely. Her eyes, gleaming with want, drifted to the rabbit meat. “Make sure the heart is cooked enough.”

“Absolutely; you get the choiciest bits.” He suppressed his displeasure at the sight of a cooked heart, concerned about offending her or make her feel shy for her preference. As he monitored the last moments of cooking, his mind settled into a state of restless fatigue. He wanted to sleep, yet he also wanted to talk; in fact, being alone in the wilderness with only one travel companion made him realize that he was a chattier person that he’d thought. “Tammaeroth?” he asked.

“Hmm?” she hummed without looking up from the meat. Even though she’d take a turn on watch first, she already seemed a bit winded, likely from marching in most of her armor all day.

“Would it be alright if I ask you another food question?”

She tilted her head up to see him. Though she looked as subdued as one would expect after a day of travel on foot, he eyes shined in response to his question. They’d gone hours without speaking as they’d walked - indeed, she was a pleasant person to travel with in that she felt no discomfort in silence. However, having finished the arduous walk for a day, her energy level seemed to rise when they interacted at rest.

“It’s alright,” she replied. For a second, she let her lips hang open as if she’d say more, but she stopped herself and stared at him, clearly holding back.

“Okay. You said prefer to eat the heart. In grimoires and conjuration accounts, there’s mention of Dremora boasting about eating the hearts of mortals. Are hearts considered a delicacy?”

Her expression began to shift as she listened to the question. In a matter of seconds, the sort of pouty runway model look she always maintained melded into a level of curiosity beyond what he’d seen from her so far. In fact, he could have sworn that she looked amused. The expression suited her, and he smiled just seeing it.

“Not a delicacy; food is just fuel. Hearts are the best fuel. Hearts are the power of the fallen bodies.”

“So you do have a favorite food,” he said with a grin.

“No,” she retorted, though she was still visibly amused.

“Oh come on, you just expressed a preference!”

“No.” She was looking down at her sword again, her eyebrows still arching curiously.

“You must find hearts to be better food than other parts.”

Sighing deeply, she shook her head even when her spirits appeared to be high. “Food is just fuel,” she repeated like a mantra.

As happy as he was to see her lightening up, he respected her desire to appear disinterested in food and didn’t push the topic again. Instead, he took a stick and roughly drew a map in the dirt between them. Her eyes moved from her sword to the lines in the dirt, sticking to what was obviously a map.

“This is the way to Rellenthil,” he said while drawing a path around a mountain. “By this time tomorrow, we should be there. From Rellenthil to Shimmerene, it will take a week if we go on foot-“

“You said it would take a week from Alindor!” Tammaeroth said loudly though without aggression. Mildly self conscious at her own outburst, she cleared her throat when she saw Lloyd recoil. “You said it would take a week from Alindor,” she repeated quietly.

“I did, and both statements are correct. Look.” He drew an outline of the entire island of Summerset, scooting around to make enough space for it. “A direct trip from Alindor to Shimmerene, on foot, would take a week through the wilderness. To go from Alindor to Rellenthil is a worthy detour.”

Pouting again, she stared at him for a while. Not angry so much as annoyed and perplexed, she didn’t take the term ‘detour’ well. “Lloyd…you promised to help me, and my mission is to help you. This,” she said while pointing to Rellenthil on his dirt map, “isn’t helping me to help you.”

“It is, trust me. I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize your mission.”

“Then why are you adding two extra days to our journey? There are people after you, I need to get you off the island as soon as possible.”

“We can’t go on like this, Tammaeroth. Look at us. We’re eating roots and berries, and one rabbit. I’m wearing torn clothes and old shoes; your armor is tarnished. All of my belongings are forfeit in Alindor; I’m a foreigner in Aldmeri territory, and the Mage Guild will forsake me to defend its own neutral status. That means I lost all my money, all my clothes, all my armor, all my books…” Lloyd paused, feeling melancholy as it finally dawned on him how permanent the change in his life was. “…every book I had, even my spell books. My ID and travel documents. We have nothing to carry water in, so we’ll have to gorge ourselves in the morning and get walking…no soap, no potions, no…gosh, I didn’t realize how destitute we really are.”

A quiet moment passed between them as he looked down at his map. Tammaeroth was strangely quiet, but when he looked up at her, she spoke in an uncharacteristically free manner.

“You have my condolences for your losses,” she said, eyes downcast.

He watched her reaction, curious at how personal it was. The distance she’d maintained until then decreased a bit. “You seem like you’ve had to leave everything behind once, too,” he sighed. Rather than taking the opportunity to commiserate, she became visibly nervous again and changed the subject.

“Tell me what you want from this Rellenthil place,” she said without making eye contact.

“Sure, sure.” He watched her for a moment and wondered what was going on in her head, but he resigned himself to admitting that, even if they were getting along very well, it wasn’t his business if she didn’t want it to be. “We’ll need new clothes, including you. We may be able to get an oiled bag for your gear, but not much travel gear - we can’t spare the expense. We’ll need waterskins and hard rations, and honestly, a place to crash for a few days. We’re about to spend the next week sleeping in shifts in the wilderness again, so a solid night’s sleep wouldn’t hurt.”

She nodded and listened closely, able to disappear into the topic. “So really, it could take eight days to complete my mission, not one week.”

“I suppose so, yes. Will that be a problem?”

“No, I just like to know,” she replied.

Resigned to leave personal topics for the night, he turned his curiosity to their goal. “So what happens after nine days?” he asked.

At first, she didn’t seem to realize what he’d asked. “Then we can use the plane to reenter Nirn and…” Her voice drifted off, and he could see that there was hesitation in her eyes.

“Do you know what’s supposed to happen after I enter this portal to Oblivion?”

“You must enter the portal-“ She prevented herself from imposing her mission on him when she saw him smile at her reaction. Avoiding another comment from him on trust, she managed to read him well enough to answer the actual question. “You must have to get back to Nirn outside of Summerset. It doesn’t matter where specifically.”

“So that’s it? Your mission ends there?” She didn’t answer even though she was clearly thinking about it. “Tammaeroth, what happens after I escape from Summerset?”

“My mission ends once you do,” she said, but there was a reluctance in her tone that didn’t make sense.

“So all of this will be over - the crazy people following me, you having my back?”

“Nobody will be following you once you’re off this island,” she said with the same reluctance. Her omission made it clear what she was dodging, but he couldn’t ask where she would be post-mission without prying into her personal business again.

“You don’t have a problem staying in Rellenthil, right?” he asked, changing the subject on his own accord this time, much to her relief.

“What? Well, maybe. You were right when you said that most mortals would have run away from me already. Your kind fears us for a reason. I’m concerned about people alerting the guards.”

“I see why you might be, but you don’t need to worry. My friend is a bigwig in a large organization there. I know for a fact that she has access to a few places where we could sleep without anybody noticing…the back room in the House of Reveries, a shack usually used for storing supplies…we’ll be safe.”

“And your friend?” Tammaeroth asked intently. “I know how most mortals react to suddenly seeing one of our kind. She may not be so willing to accommodate you if you show up on her doorstep with a daedra.”

“You’re correct, of course, about the fear most mortals have for daedra; it’s also fair to say that even Alchemy may be shocked to meet you, which is a reaction we can plan for. But she won’t then me away, nor you once she sees that you’re not an enemy. She, of all people, wouldn’t judge you based on the actions of others. ‘Your kind,’ ‘our kind’ aren’t even in her dictionary.”

Skepticism remained latently in Tammaeroth’s demeanor, but she kept it to herself. Truth be told, Lloyd feared her reaction upon the inevitable meeting more than Alchemy’s, though he couldn’t speak for the rest of the town’s inhabitants. In fact, he hasn’t even considered how he’d get Tammaeroth from the road into town to the House without anyone noticing the daedric woman walking through town. They were running a huge risk for the sake of food and sleep.

That subject could wait, though; both of their stomachs were growling. He handed her a skewer with her half of the meat plus the heart on it.

“I’m pretty sure this is done,” he said while handing her the skewer. She looked at the burned meat with the same skepticism she’d shown toward the prospects of staying in Rellenthil, garnering a laugh from him. “At least it isn’t diseased,” he chortled while taking a bite from his own flavorless meal.

“It’s just fuel,” she sighed while chewing on the rabbit heart.


	16. His Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a few days on the run, a certain sorcerer is in dire need of a dip in the creek. His demonic bodyguard struggles to adapt to an unprecedented situation.

Running on only minimal hours of sleep, Lloyd and Tammaeroth collected their minuscule pile of belongings and returned to the bend in the creek at dawn. In addition to drinking water and relieving themselves, they’d also need to forage - there was a better chance of finding edible food at the water source. After a day and two nights of their escape into the wilds, there was also another basic necessity which was plaguing the human’s mind.

While Tammaeroth gorged herself on the remaining berries they hadn’t eaten in the bushes at the tree line, Lloyd removed his old shoes and socks, looking as if they were ten years old after a day of hiking. After letting the water lap at his toes, he pulled his dirty, mud-stained mage robes over his head and bundled them up. He absolutely detested poor hygiene, and a single day away from running water was all he could take. Casual and unassuming, he’d already removed his long shorts and undershirt before Tammaeroth was reaching for her sword in alarm.

“Lloyd, what are you doing! There could be wild animals around here!”

Her voice carried such a sense of panic that he jumped, and the creek felt much colder to his feet than it should have. He turned to her, filthy clothes bundled up in his arms, watching as she scanned the area for hostile targets. She wasn’t wearing armor herself since they were still preparing to leave, wearing only a combination of leather and cloth for padding beneath her gear.

“Your vigilance is uncanny,” he chortled as he took a few steps into the creek.

She edged closer, looking into the shallow creek bed as if territorial minnows could materialize there. “Did you even check for river monsters first? This isn’t helpful!”

“Don’t worry, I know this region. There isn’t anything poisonous or exceptionally large in the surface water.” Wading into the thigh-deep center of the creek, he began to dip his clothes beneath the clear surface.

She stared at him full of nervous energy. Her grip on the hilt of her sword tightened, and her eyes checked the banks of the creek multiple times as if monsters could still pop out of nowhere, yet she also glanced at him incredulously. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep my underwear on,” he joked, guessing that she wasn’t used to bathing in a river. Come to think of it, he didn’t know if daedra needed to bathe at all in Oblivion.

Though her eye movement continued rapidly, it eventually centered mostly on him, his clothes, and the surface of the water around him. “What if we’ve been followed; enemies could be carrying bows!” she exclaimed while shaking her head.

Suppressing his laughter to make it clear that it was with her and not at her, he shook his head right back. “Tammaeroth, these are normal robes; I don’t usually expend resources enchanting things I can’t sell, so there’s no form of protection on them. They’re as vulnerable as my flesh.” She flinched awkwardly at the word ‘flesh,’ and he continued talking to avoid making her any more shy than necessary. “Look, just as much as you need me to survive the next week, I need to survive for my whole lifetime. I wouldn’t be doing this if I thought it was dangerous. Plus, I detest poor hygiene…I don’t want to spend the rest of our journey smelling like a Nord swineherd. Could I just bathe while my clothes dry?”

Though he’d phrased his intent as a question, he continued rinsing his clothes in the creek as she awkwardly sought anything other than his eyes to look at. Eventually, she overcame her paranoia, if not her nervousness. “I grant my permission,” she replied uncomfortably, visibly gulping as if she expected to find a reason to regret her words at any moment.

He didn’t waste time. “Thank you; I promise that I won’t delay.” He promptly finished rinsing out his clothes and waded to the banks of the creek again, hanging the garments on the branches of a leafless tree to dry. Her eyes didn’t leave him as he waded back into the middle of the creek, which he initially chalked up to her obsession with her escort quest.

Delighted to finally feel clean, Lloyd paid little attention to his surroundings as he dunked himself beneath the surface of the water. The temperature was cool and the current light, almost as nice as an actual shower. By the time he’d finished washing up, he’d only just noticed that Tammaeroth was staring at him like a victim of hypnosis. Her sword hilt laid gently in his fingers, all previous tension lost as the weapon nearly tumbled to the ground. When she realized that he’d seen her staring, her eyes widened comically and she swiftly turned away in embarrassment.

Flattered by her reaction, he tried to play off his discovery to spare her further embarrassment as an act of mercy. He trudged to the shoreline of small stones and laid down. “It will take a few minutes for everything to dry,” he said casually. “I can keep watch while you take your turn.”

Immediately, her crimson markings shifted in color as she blushed. “My…turn?” she asked, nearly experiencing a meltdown right there.

“Only if you want to, I mean,” he said. “We can start walking north, or I can keep watch while you take a few minutes here. It’s up to you.”

“Well…maybe…” What appeared to be a mental battle took place in her head as she froze, unable to react. He’d have been lying if he’d said she wasn’t cute when flustered, especially in comparison to how vicious she was when confronted with an enemy. Her contrasting moods had him giddy enough to smile wide, and he covered his mouth with his hand to avoid adding to her discomfort. “But what if we’re attacked?”

“I’m not helpless, Tammaeroth. I’m a bit rusty, but knowledge of combat magic is coming back to me. I can also hurl these stones pretty hard.” While still laying down, he tossed one up in the air and caught it. “Your sword is also ready if you need it…but, I mean, it’s all up to you. I’m down for anything.”

From his peripheral vision, he noticed her looking at him, then the water, then back at him. Though still blushing, she fidgeted less and less as the seconds ticked by. Not quite calm but slightly comforted when left to consider the choice on her own, she seemed to get over the imaginary hump of bathing with her underclothes on.

Her sword clinked as she laid it down next to him; she lingered for a few seconds until he opened his eyes. “Alert me if a challenger is near,” she said after a deep breath.


	17. Her Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As he starts to realize, she has rather bad luck. Not in any specific aspect, but in general.

Lloyd continued to lay down and stare up at the sky while Tammaeroth removed her boots and laid them next to her sword. The sound of the small, smooth stones clinking under her steps was pleasant, and he almost started to forget that they were outside city limits and deep in the woods.

A small bit of leather wraps covered parts of her body which met with joints in her armor: her collar bone, her knees and elbows, and her hips. She laid those in the branches near his clothing without dipping them in the water; neither of them knew enough about laundry to directly remove the remaining grease from the tunnel fight, and they merely hoped that the sun would dry those parts as much as possible. She then walked to the edge of the water and watched the water flowing. She was still wearing a minimal amount of cloth padding, also for protecting her flesh from armor-induced abrasions, and also tainted by her fall into a sludge pit on the first night of their journey.

As Tammaeroth stood at the edge and looked conflicted over the act, Lloyd wondered how ethical it would be if he watched her the way she’d watched him. He hadn’t minded, of course. He was of the thinking that all people enjoyed a bit of visual flattery, and that problems only arose if the flatterer was unwelcome - not from the flattery itself. Still, she seemed awfully nervous any time they ventured into topics more personal than killing things and escaping Summerset, and he felt almost certain that being ogled by him could send her into panic mode. Mustering up all the willpower he could, he tried to train his eyes on the early morning clouds.

That test of his willpower was beyond any other he could remember, for he hadn’t even resolved to avoid peeking at her for a whole two seconds before she stripped off the cloth padding for her armor, leaving her clad only in her underwear as he was. Her action made sense, of course - she was only doing what he’d done, washing and rinsing her garments in the river while bathing with her underwear on. The theory behind all of that was far different from application, though, and soon enough he found his eyes drifting from the clouds down to the water.

To say she was a specimen would have been the understatement of the eon. Perfect to a degree that almost seemed like a mockery of mortal beauty, the immortal demoness kept her back to him as she bathed. A measure of guilt over observing her nipped at his proverbial heels, though not sharply enough to totally dissuade him from sneaking a peek every so often. Her physique was deserving of artwork, her graceful yet powerful movements worthy of poetry. When he realized that he was enjoying himself a little too much, and that he was only covered by a pair of damp underwear, he finally desisted in his stealthy appreciation in order to save them both from embarrassment.

After a few too many moments, she seemed to have learned how to do laundry and lifted her clothing out of the water. Slow, purposeful footsteps carried her out of the creek so she could hang her clothes on the leafless branches next to his, and he felt like not rolling over to watch her stripped down and glistening with water to be a task of heroic proportions. Yet somehow, he managed to continue staring at the clouds and tried to think unsexy thoughts lest she notice any suspicious movement beneath what little clothing he was wearing. The sound of her movement stopped for a few moments, leaving only a light breeze between them. Come to think of it…she’d already hung up her clothes in the branches. Why her activity stopped was a mystery to him.

On a whim, he opened his eyes to find the clouds moving in the sky and, in the corner of his eye, the sideways image of her head as she stifled a gasp and turned around. Her footsteps padded on the stones, far lighter than when she was in combat, while she hurried back to the water. He turned his head and followed her, noticing the spring in her step as she walked away. Had she been…staring at him while he was laying there? His heart beat a little faster as he imagined why she’d been standing there staring down to him and what sort of thoughts had been going through her head which caused her such embarrassment when he’d caught her looking.

Poor at acting, she nervously bathed in the creek and tried to play off the awkward incident. Her back to him again, she washed with hands lacking her usual dexterity. Eventually, she peeked over her shoulder, the roundness of her face gradually emerging in a movement she may have considered subtle. Their eyes met if only briefly before they both pretended it was an accident, leaving her to dunk her head in the surface for what had to be the fourth time. Grinning giddily, he waited a few moments before glancing over to see her form rising up out of the water again. Against the green backdrop of the underbrush across the creek, her grey form was easy to discern, and her dark complexion made every intricacy of her anatomy easy to spy. The fact that her underwear was white, like his, brought out fine details he may not otherwise have noticed.

When she turned again, their eyes met, yet this time they didn’t break away immediately. Though that nervousness was still visible in her eyes as she gazed at him, she almost seemed energized by it. The breeze blew by again, rustling the bushes as the two of them didn’t simply pretend that they hadn’t noticed the other. All of a sudden, the fact that they were alone together in the woods thrust itself into the figurative spotlight, hypnotizing them as they both admired each other openly.

She was so different when at rest. All that aggression and violent movement melted away, revealing a core personality that a demonic being shouldn’t have possessed at any level, in public or in private. Even her posture was so effeminate and lacking in the sort of militant readiness he’d grown used to seeing in her. The scowl which he’d originally thought was just her face disappeared, leaving behind the pleasant demeanor of a shy person who was finally becoming comfortable.

Eyes locked on to his, she turned to face him and slowly reached up to her jet black locks. Strong fingers weakly laced themselves in her wet hair, stringing it together and ringing it out rhythmically. Squeezing the water out to let it flow down her chest and them stomach, she almost transformed into another person, turning a seemingly innocent act into a display neither of them were likely to ever forget, all from the simple act of her bathing in front of him. For a few seconds at the end, he felt a sense of warmth when he saw her lips pull into what was almost a smile.

Their quiet moment together, verging on the edge of intimate, was blotted out like the sun as a shadow fell over them both. Vulnerable and unaware, they both had their little fantasy shattered when the heavy beating of a gryphon’s wings dashed whatever hopes they’d had for the morning.


	18. Time Not Wasted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Circumstance can provide both obstacles and catalysts for growth.

The two of them frowned while looking at each other, initially dumbfounded by the unwelcome intrusion on their privacy. The breeze suddenly made the water on their skin feel cold and frigid, and both Lloyd and Tammaeroth turned to see the large aerial predator soaring toward them. The beast must have been circling them for some time, for it was already swooping down to dive bomb them.

Tammaeroth reacted first. “Jump in!” she shouted while taking a few steps toward him.

Without screeching or giving any other sign of its approach aside from its shadow, the gryphon bent its wings and rapidly gained speed. Lloyd rolled over and scrambled on top of the stones, sliding on the bank of the creek as he tried to get his mind out of fantasy and back to reality. Tammaeroth slid forward and grabbed his hand, pulling him the rest of the way under the surface and forcibly dunking him into the water. In any other context, the feeling of her body pressed against his as they held each other in the creek would have marked the beginning of a trashy smut novel straight out of the Wayrest trade district. In this case, however, there was nothing sexual as the two nearly-naked travelers cling to each other beneath the wake of the gryphon narrowly missing their heads.

Too heavy to maintain balance when hitting the water, the gryphon allowed them to duck into the creek and continued on its arc, swooping back up into the air and circling around them again. Tammaeroth rose first, all softness gone from her demeanor as she bared her teeth at the flying creature preparing to come at them again. Her eyes fell to her gear a few meters away, and she seemed to be measuring the distance between her target, her weapon, and herself.

Without thinking, Lloyd reached a hand toward her sword and began channeling a spell he’d used so much at his recent jobs that he hadn’t even thought to use it for anything else. The wispy aura of his telekinesis spell surrounded her great sword, causing it merely to jiggle at first. Smooth white stones from the shore were flung about, and a few were even affected and floated up into the air as the weapon unsteadily flew in the air toward its bearer. Not needing to be prompted, she grabbed it and stepped out of the water, waving for him to follow. Covered in nothing except for wet underwear, the two of them had little protection, prompting him to conjure his novice’s ward to cover them in anticipation of impact.

This time, the gryphon did screech, sending out a mind-numbing sound wave that caused Lloyd to duck and cover his ears and Tammaeroth to flinch. Not only had it broken their initiative, but the audial attack also sundered their defenses, shattering the light blue energy conjured to protect them. The pair was again exposed in more ways than one as the aerial beast opened its break and talons.

Seconds from certain death, Tammaeroth swung forward with a huge overhanded arc, ignoring the clear and imminent danger to her person. Her great sword’s length proved its worth at the height of her arc, for the reach it provided was greater than that of the gryphon’s limbs. Her blade cut into one of the gryphon’s paws, splitting the appendage down the middle with a loud, heavy thud as bones were broken as cleanly as flesh. A suppressed screech transformed into a growl as she gryphon wavered in its swoop and wobbled, barely keeping its balance after the clean slice to its paw. It continued flying away from them, likely in shock after the failure of what must have appeared to be an easy meal.

Once again reaching into a repertoire he hadn’t used offensively in so long, Lloyd took aim at their moving target before he even realized what he was doing. Aiming to destroy the beast’s natural composition, he cast a draining spell which sapped the gryphon’s energy and staggered it in midair. The rough movement of the resisting creature caused the human to lose his grip on his spell aim, but he hadn’t needed more than a second. Encumbered to the point of collapse, the beast hit the bank of the creek hard, sending out a shockwave of little white stones when it crashed. Bones snapped as audibly as Tammaeroth’s bare feet trampling the stones, and Lloyd wondered how she could march over them so fast without hurting her soles. The way the gryphon reared up defensively removed any thoughts he had other than their safety, though, and he followed her as quickly as he could.

Under normal circumstances, a downed flying beast would have been easy pickings for a demonic warrior; however, her complete lack of protection prevented her from simply rushing in, and the swipes of the gryphon’s uninjured paw held her at bay. Lucky in his reaction considering his lack of forethought, Lloyd cast another simple spell he’d crafted himself, causing more bolts of degenerative energy to arc in and out of the beast’s body. This time, he felt his Magicka replenished rather than his physical well-being, and the creature’s attention - however fraught it was due to its injuries - turned to him. His demonic companion only needed a split second to stab the gryphon through the heart with her blade’s tip, and she left it to scrabble on the stones as it bled out.

As the beast suffered a slow death, the pair caught their breath and looked all around them. Any tender notions of their privacy there in the wilderness were shattered for them both, and paranoia quickly settled in.

“Do these creatures attack in pairs?” she asked while whirling around, her scowl having returned.

While catching his breath, he shook his head. “No, they’re solitary. And they don’t hunt in dense foliage-“

Before he could even finish his sentence, she grabbed him by the arm and dragged him beyond the tree line. Her fingers left marks on his bicep from the roughness of her grip, and he could feel how tense she’d become. “We let our guard down,” she grumbled, perhaps not knowing or caring that he could hear her.

“Look, we’re safer here under the trees. Plus, the rest of the trip will be far from open areas.”

She shook her head though she didn’t explain why. “Then we need to leave. We’ve already wasted too much time on frivolities.”

Frowning at the way she viewed it, he tried to focus on calming her nerves. She looked like a saber cat stuck in a steel trap, almost sabotaging her own efforts via recklessness. “Please, let’s slow down for a second. It will be another day of nonstop walking, only this time away from water sources.”

“I need my armor,” she said while watching the gryphon corpse.

“Tammaeroth, we need food and water.”

Silent though not pausing, she continued to hang tensely between him and the last trees overlooking the creek. Crouching and at the ready, she seemed torn between actually engaging him in conversation and charging back to the stony bank to confront an imaginary enemy. That light breeze blew by again, punctuating the quiet moment as the two of them stood in the woods in their underwear, in effectively looking at their clothing and the bloodstained corpse near the water.

Time ticked by and was lost to them, and he tried to move forward to stand next to her. Her free hand shot out and pushed against his bare chest; had they been fully clothed, the act wouldn’t have registered for either of them, but the feeling of her skin on his was enough to give them both pause. She turned around to look at her hand on his chest, then up at him, back down to her hand, then at the gryphon. She pulled her hand away from him, letting it linger between them briefly before retaking her battle stance.

“Lloyd…we’ve already lost so much time. We don’t know what our enemies are planning.”

“You’re right; that’s absolutely a concern. But we have things we need to do here before we just run off. We’re about to spend a day walking away from water sources, so we need to drink as much as possible now. We’re more likely to find food we can carry here, and we’ll need to spend time gathering it. That would give our clothes time to dry.”

“No. We don’t have time for our clothes to dry. Help me get my armor on.”

“Please, think about this! We need to drink and gather food, or we’ll die. There’s no reason not to let our clothes dry.”

“No.”

“Tammaeroth!”

He reached out and laid a hand on her shoulder. Innocent and reactionary, he hadn’t thought of the situation they were in when he subconsciously tried to connect with her. Her skin was far too soft for that of a demonic soldier, smooth and falsely delicate, and he couldn’t finish his sentence upon contact. She likely felt it too, turning to stare at the point of contact as she had previously. He didn’t dare remove his hand, however, because it would have been too obvious.

Fighting to ignore the tense warmth in his hand, he spoke softly. “The most likely food which we’ll find here will be berries and tubers. Maybe nuts. All of that exists at near the tree line, under cover. I don’t think we’re any more likely to encounter another one of these things than we are to be struck by lightning twice, but even if we do, we won’t be out in the open. There’s no reason to get dressed prematurely, especially when we can still profit from this situation.”

Nervous under his touch, she lost focus on her nonexistent target and actually started to respond cogently. “Profit from a random attack?” she asked skeptically.

“Yes, this is actually a win for us,” he replied, delighted that she was taking him seriously. “You just slayed a gryphon, the apex predator on this island. People here are so scared of these animals, and so rarely brave enough to hunt them, that anything we can scavenge is valuable. Its plume, talons, beak…we can sell those in Rellenthil. My friend will help as much as she can, but we’ll still have roughly a week of travel thereafter. Buying supplies will be easier than foraging.” He stopped once she loosened up and straightened her back, giving her time to think about what he’d said. Eventually, she nodded her head but didn’t say anything. “Does it make sense, what I’m suggesting?”

She lowered her sword. “I suppose,” she sighed. “But we’ve lost so much time.”

“Is there anything I can do to help you feel better about how we’re using our time?”

She did a double take so animated that she involuntarily turned to face him. “What?”

“Can I help prepare in such a way-“

“I understood what you said!” she replied roughly. “I know what your words mean. I just don’t understand why you talk like that.”

He truly didn’t know how to respond to her question. “Because…I want people to feel respected and empowered when I talk to them?” he asked out loud. “I don’t really think about it consciously.”

Relaxed enough to look at him with steady eyes, she considered what he said without her usual fidgeting and shifting around. Although she’d been steadily growing more comfortable during their interactions, this was probably the fastest instance in which he’d seen her overcome her anxiety when standing close to him. It felt quite nice, standing there in the woods just sharing a quiet moment when their conversation had paused, and he savored the moment in which she measured her response.

“Thank you,” she said spontaneously. He hadn’t told her to add ‘you’ at the end, so he guessed the must have learned the full expression from their interactions. “I’ll scavenge what I can from this beast; I don’t know how to find my own food on your world. Gather all you can until I say so. Don’t leave my sight, don’t leave the tree line, and don’t run away.”

Her polite seriousness made him smile, and she looked surprised to see it. “There’s nowhere I’d rather be right now,” he said. Unable to stop himself, he gave her shoulder a little squeeze, shocking even himself by the action. Her eyes widened, and the previous confidence he’d seen her again disappeared.

Playing off a shiver up her spine as a roll of her shoulders, she moved away from him a little to fast and inadvertently kicked a bunch of stones on her way to the creek. He smiled to himself as he turned away, making sure not to watch her walk and make her feel even more anxious. As it was, he questioned whether or not he’d done something inappropriate by the small display of affection. The two of them parted wordlessly, carrying out their respective tasks for the better part of an hour.


	19. Last Stretch to Rellenthil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Respect for boundaries matters more than confessionals.

Having gorged themselves on water for as long as Tammaeroth could tolerate the delay, she and Lloyd gathered up what they could and shared their journey north. The creek bath and the gryphon attack had set them back over an hour, which caused an hour’s worth of complaining from her once they’d started walking. Her militant attitude toward time management was as helpful as it was a source of annoyance, and Lloyd spent quite a bit of energy redirecting her irritation toward a discussion of their trip, the maps of the area he could remember, and contingency plans were they to face any further delays. By the time they needed to rest in the early afternoon, she seemed to have gotten over their morning mishap and provided only minimal opposition to the notion of stopping.

On a hilltop nearly breaking out from the woods and even with the canopy, the two of them sat in the underbrush against a lonely tree if only because she didn’t want to be out in the open. Having taken turns freshening up and keeping watch, they both sat in the bushes and ate only the minimal amount of shoots for energy (though they ate all the wild nuts they’d gathered in minutes). Lloyd recounted how many gryphon feathers and talons Tammaeroth had severed from the animal’s corpse, but she seemed more focused on the present than the future.

Her eyes trained on the mountains to the north, behind which laid the destination she’d never seen. There was a lingering suspicion in her eyes that he guessed must have been earned over many decades of Oblivion politics and backstabbing, but he didn’t dare to pry without her bringing it up. She didn’t seem to realize how he was watching her, though. “Do those creatures roost within forests?” she asked while scanning the horizon.

He shook his head but waited to finish chewing before he spoke. “No, not possible. They’re barely light enough to fly - probably the second heaviest airborne species after dragons. They need solid ground to roost in.”

“Like those mountains,” she murmured, fixated on their visual markers.

“Yes…yes, like them, but,” he said while raising his finger for emphasis, “we’ll have total forest cover around the west side according to every map I’ve seen.”

For the time being, she seemed satisfied with his statement, though he’d told her that three times. Her obsessive focus on any perceived threat to their journey to Shimmerene fascinated him, especially because she seemed so reluctant to explain it. Though he didn’t want to pry into her personal matters, her mission felt professional, especially because it involved him. Once they’d completed their meager meal, he waited a while until her seriousness had evened out. She didn’t quite look serene, but she was probably as close to that as a soldier created from a martial race could be.

“Tammaeroth?”

She actually didn’t answer at first. The way she just looked over the horizon was worthy of a painting, if only Lloyd had the talent for any kind of art. He felt like there was a lot going on in her head that had never been spoken out loud before, which only encouraged the little voice in his head pressuring him to sneak in personal questions. Thankfully, he resisted the urge when she hummed to him in affirmation that she’d heard him.

“You’re very devoted to your mission. It’s an admirable trait, but I can’t stop wondering about it. You’ve been sent to protect me so I can continue…reading books, from what I understand.” Despite keeping her gaze fixed on the mountains, there was a shift in her eyes that signaled her attention moving to his words. “But my reading is a little disorganized. I just have various pet issues and favored subjects, but I’ve never actually performed research or anything. I’m like thousands of other people who just read about a lot of random topics. Why has Hermaeus Mora taken an interest in me of all people?”

She sighed enough that her shoulders moved up and down. The topic was obviously one that she didn’t enjoy talking about, but her reaction was different than before. Her singular focus on the here and now made him doubt that she’d really reconsidered how much she could or couldn’t tell him, but the bonding they’d done over the past few days must have caused a change of heart. Not resistance so much as fatigue shined in her eyes when she turned toward him slightly.

“You know about our planes and our ways…that much is clear. You know, then, that my people are a military order as much as a race of people.”

“You’re connecting this to how you want to phrase your answer?” he asked.

“Correct. I want you to understand that I’m telling you the truth when I say that I don’t fully understand what your purpose is. When I was given my mission, I only asked for as many details as I felt I need to succeed. Questions about anything else represent frivolities which I can’t claim of my own volition.”

He leaned back and rested his head against the tree. “You’re not curious to know how your efforts fit into the bigger picture? Or the reasons why you’re needed for certain tasks?”

Her answer surprised him. “Of course I’d prefer to know,” she replied naturally, without pretense, and without realizing that such an answer would only give rise to more questions.

“If you’d like to know, then why not ask?”

“Because I can’t.”

He stopped himself from asking why again, both to avoid annoying or prying into more secrets she preferred to keep. The contradiction bemused him, though, and he found himself drawn to the sense of mystery she created more than the actual topic itself. “I respect your adherence to your people’s strict codes,” he conceded, trying to signal that he’d let the subject rest. However, she seemed to have grown so comfortable that she actually continued talking.

“I don’t,” she mumbled.

“Hmm?”

“I…nothing.”

“No, it’s okay. I’m actually interested, if you want to say it.”

“You don’t know what I planned on saying, Lloyd.”

“True, but I have an educated guess. You seemed to be saying that you don’t respect your people’s codes.”

She turned her entire torso to look at him, mouth agape. His guess was rather elementary given the direction of their conversation, and her shock suggested that she truly hadn’t realized he could predict what she’d wanted to say. How a creature borne of the convoluted politics of Oblivion could be surprised by that caused him to feel surprised as well.

Mouth slowly closing, she looked him in the eye with that shy expression for a moment, yet she didn’t withdraw into herself this time. She held his gaze while measuring her words. “I didn’t mean to express that. My mind slipped.”

He turned to face her as well, trying to look sympathetic. “There’s nothing wrong with boundaries; there’s no a soul - or a vestige - without secrets. But if you ever feel like talking about it, then I’m willing to listen.”

As he’d felt a few times before, her melancholy look made him think that she’d prefer to tell him just as she’d prefer to know why she’d been sent to protect him. Speaking on anything near the personal was quite the ordeal for her, though, and she spoke only with an amount of hesitation that seemed anxiety-inducing for them both. “Talking doesn’t help,” she sighed while shaking her head. “Talking leads to trouble.” She breathed heavily and looked back over the horizon, still tense and anxious like she wasn’t truly finished. “My people’s codes are perfect; failing to respect them is a mistake.” She looked down at her lap in disappointment. “Tell me about those mountains,” she said brusquely, displaying an unexpected amount of social savvy by her quick change of subject.

His sympathy overriding his curiosity, he gladly obliged her distraction. “Our ever present guides. We can avoid hiking uphill if we keep to the west - it’s on the left side from where we’re looking. Can you see where the western slope disappears into the rest of the surrounding hills?”

She nodded. “I see it,” she replied solemnly.

“You’re seeing our path, basically. The further up the slope we veer, the more work we create for ourselves; we have every reason to remain under forest cover. Once we pass the mountain, there’s a downward incline until Rellenthil for a few miles.”

“Is it forested?”

“Not so much, no.”

“But will might have fallen by then?”

“Definitely,” he replied. “We’ve lost a bit of time, so we’ll likely arrive a bit later than I’d expected.”

“Then we can leave forest cover without being seen by the locals.” She looked back up to the mountain, reminding him of how long she’d been hanging her head low before rising back up again. “This may be the hardest part. If I’m seen, then other mortals will panic. If they panic, they may alert the police. If they alert the police, then I’ll be forced to end the threat they pose.”

He leaned over and touched her arm, breaking the spell of seriousness which had seemed to hang over her. “I promise that I’ll do everything I can to help you avoid that. I know the town…I know how we can sneak around. I did it a few times myself. My mission is the same as yours.”

That comment resonated with her more than any other. For the most fleeting of moments, her lips almost pulled into a smile again. The tension was gone from her shoulders, and she nodded directly at him - a Dremora nodding to a human as she would one of her comrades. Though she didn’t speak, the way she reached for his hand and slipped her fingers into it, giving it a tight squeeze, said far more than her words could have. Her hand twitched, and he was convinced that she felt the same little tingle in the appendage that he did. She let go a second later, but his hand still felt warm thereafter.

A few minutes later, they were hiking again. The clock was ticking for their thirst and fatigue, and they wasted no time in following the path around the mountain for the other half the day. By the wee hours of the night, they’d reach the outer ring of the Rellenthil forum.


	20. First Impressions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alchemy isn’t one to be fooled by a front. That being said, the inevitable introduction goes surprisingly well.

After ten hours of walking with barely a break, the pair shambled into the outer vineyards of Rellenthil. The town wasn’t exactly known for its wine, and those vineyards were sparse and low, but they provided just enough cover in the dark of night for the pair to stumble into the town without being noticed. Given the trek they’d finally completed, they needed the soft cover provided by the vineyards; they were both meandering and breathing heavily, and they even stole a few grapes from collection baskets which had been left about just to put something in their stomachs.

For the first half of their hike around the mountains, they’d kept themselves busy by discussing the various routes they could take to reach Shimmerene. Tammaeroth gradually became more talkative once they’d focused on her mission and how to complete it, but they eventually reached a point whereby even she felt winded from speaking and hiking at the same time. Lloyd’s body had gone from soreness to a general sort of numbness such that he ambled forward like a zombie with a level of energy to match. By the time they’d reached the end of the vineyards and began slinking against the stone buildings of the town, he felt the familiar sense of an impending crash at the end of a long trip.

He removed the pieces of Tammaeroth’s armor he’d been wearing during the trip and helped her to put it all back on. “Listen, we’re going to be a bit disingenuous in the beginning. Can you pretend that you’re a mortal only dressed as a daedra?”

Following quietly behind him as they sneaked against the back wall of structures he vaguely remembered, she showed both the patience of a soldier as well as the thinly veiled aggression of a true demon. “Very well, Lloyd…but do your part to keep your friend quiet. If I have to do it myself, then I’ll do it as my kind tend to do.” Before he could respond, she included an addendum. “I don’t want that to happen for you. Don’t make me have to intervene.”

Her extra comment seemed designed to reassure him that they were a team, or at least that she didn’t want to cause problems for him. Warmed as he was by her addition, though, he felt a measure of his own nervousness in anticipation of the meeting he’d been planning for. “Of course; I’ll do my best,” he replied, concealing his wariness over how exactly he’d orchestrate the first impression between the two.

The moon was high in the sky, and he wagered that it was around midnight by the time they’d reached the back of the House of Reveries. Nary a soul was awake at that hour, though the presence of a few owls as well as the activity of the night shift at a nearby bakery created enough ambient noise that he felt comfortable leaving the safe haven of the House’s back wall. When Tammaeroth tried to follow him, he held out a hand for her to stay put against the wall. She stepped back eventually, though after a measure of hesitation, and he noticed that she kept a hand on the pommel of her sidearm.

“Here goes nothing,” he sighed while picking up a handful of pebbles from the grass.

One by one, he started to fling the little projectiles at the second story window of the building. He remembered it as being at the end of a hall between the bunk room for management and the archive. Waiting in between each throw, he eventually heard stirring in the bunk room above and waited for a shadow to move in front of the glass.

At first sight of his old friend, his heart had that familiar tingle of meeting a person who he’d parted on good terms with long ago. The familiar purple mask peeked out once the shudders were opened, and he waited for the theatrical wide sweeps of her head from side to side until she noticed him standing down on the grass right in front of each other. Though he couldn’t see her eyes from that distance, the way she gasped, strongly enough to break her grouchiness at being woken up, quickly indicated her reaction.

“Lloyd of Glenumbra!” Alchemy gasped in a high pitch. That same energy, as well as that same reserved, almost conservative body language when she was excited, brought back memories of the brief time he’d tried his hand at a career other than guarding or inscribing. “You really did come back to visit…” Her voice trailed off as she looked behind her in the hall. “Oh, and at this hour…nothing is ready for guests, this is embarrassing!”

“Hey, I guess it’s a little random, isn’t it, Alchemy?” he chucked, barely concealing the anxiety in his voice. He knew she’d see through it, though; after all, it was her who’d politely advised him in private to pursue careers other than the arts.

“That doesn’t make it any less welcome,” she said with such a sincerity that he knew she was already picking apart his intentions; had she not been, she’d have replied with empty pleasantries. “Give me a moment to come down…should I hope the front door, or the back?”

Although there wasn’t a hint of aversion in her tone, her question spoke of his swiftly she’d realized that something was wrong. “The back door might be better…if you’ll permit.”

“Oh be quiet and get inside. I’ll not have any apologizing for visit.” She closed the shudders and disappeared inside, leaving the Breton to wait anxiously outside while hoping that the Dremora didn’t feel the need to ‘neutralize’ his friend. Before he could even formulate a plan as to how he’d mediate the inevitable meeting, it already began. “Just a second…I had to creep down the stairs to avoid waking anybody up,” Alchemy said while fiddling with the door. She opened it up to reveal herself there, her voice and mask still familiar even when she was bundled up in a bathrobe and a blanket on top of it. “Goodness, Lloyd, you look like hell! Get inside.”

“I do need to mention, my friend Tammy is here,” he said, playing it cool when Tammaeroth did a double take at his spontaneous nickname for her. She was still hiding around the corner, and he didn’t want to spring her - or her distinctive armor - on his fellow mortal just yet. “She’s a fascinating person.”

Alchemy paused at the door, clearly understanding the request. “And is Tammy a discreet individual?” she asked.

“Oh, trust me…she’s an expert at keeping secrets. And she’s a lovely conversationalist once she opens up.” At that comment, Tammaeroth actually peeked around the corner to stare at him, just out of Alchemy’s field of vision. He couldn’t gauge her true reaction beneath her helmet, pushing him to get on with the introduction already. “I think she’s eager to meet you, actually,” he said, pushing Tammaeroth to shake her head at him.

Pulling the door open wider, Alchemy tried to lean past him to see. “We have room for one more, don’t worry. Though I’m interested in knowing what sort of foibles the two of you got yourselves-“ In the very instant when she spied the Dremora armor facing her around the corner, she stiffened up and gasped.

“She likes dressing up, as you can see,” he tried to laugh, though Alchemy was the last person on Nirn to be fooled by an act.

“That’s not a costume!” Alchemy whispered urgently. Tammaeroth didn’t hear her, but the warrior did seem bothered by the whispering and started to stare at the masked high elf. “Goodness, Lloyd, what have you been experimenting with?”

“You’ll believe me when I tell you that it’s a long story, right?”

“Yes, but…” Alchemy paused to look back at Tammaeroth. The two women stared at each other, both of their faces concealed but the Dremora projecting much more confidence in her posture than the Altmer. “Excuse me, Miss Tammy, but I need Lloyd for a minute,” she said while taking him by the arm. Tammaeroth’s hand shot out like a saber cat, snatching Lloyd’s other arm before Alchemy could scream. The Dremora stared up at the waifish Altmer who was taller but maybe only half her weight. The difference in grip was astounding, and Lloyd was sure that Tammaeroth left red marks on his bicep again.

“No,” Tammaeroth replied.

Her voice had its intended effect - as confident and assertive as Alchemy was, she was still a mortal, and one who lacked Lloyd’s experience with daedric magic. The high elf’s thin fingers trembled, and she clung to Lloyd more to use him as a human shield than to assert any sort of precedence in the hierarchy of friends. “Miss, a friend of Lloyd’s is a friend of mine, but I insist that you respect this house,” Alchemy said with an outwardly confident voice. Her acting skills were sharp, but Lloyd knew her well enough to pick up on the waver in her tone for a microsecond. “You can wait inside, but I must have a word with our mutual friend first.”

Without intending it, Tammaeroth squeezed Lloyd’s arm so hard that it hurt. With a well as he’d gotten along with her for the previous few days, he hadn’t noticed how gradually he’d forgotten just what Tammaeroth was. It was foolish of him - conjuration was his primary skill, and he had no excuse for his forgetfulness in that respect. He had to diffuse the situation before Tammaeroth acted according to her basic nature and made her budding disagreement with Alchemy physical.

Gently, he pulled his arm out of Alchemy’s grip, leaving he to clasp her hands together beneath the blanket she was using as a shawl. She didn’t look lost at all; her self-image was strong, especially since Lloyd and a wandering adventurer had helped her make peace with her sister. However, she did seem u characteristically tense without another person to hold on to, and he frowned sympathetically at her from an angle where Tammaeroth couldn’t see. He turned back to his demonic companion and leaned in close. She didn’t move or react the way she might have otherwise, suddenly losing her shyness about closeness to him when confronting a stranger.

“Please, follow my lead; I know a way which will gain her help for your mission,” he whispered right next to the side of Tammaeroth’s helmet. He didn’t want to speak negatively of Alchemy, but he also needed Tammaeroth to feel like he was unquestionably cooperative with her mission. “She can make things a lot easier for you.”

Tammaeroth didn’t turn away from her death gaze aimed at the high elf, not even when she whispered back. “You have one chance.”

He nodded and raised his hand to lay it on hers. Where leaning in close had failed, touching her gauntlet succeeded, and her ire was temporarily washed away. Her grip on his arm loosened, her eyes flicked to the side to meet his, and the tightness in her brow dissipated. After a bit of prying on his part, she let him take her hand in his and lead her inside the doorway. Alchemy gave the daedra wide berth.

“It’s been a very long journey, and Tammy and I wouldn’t mind a big of water, if there’s any around,” he said while leading Tammaeroth to a single wooden chair against the wall, just next to the back door. She wouldn’t sit down, but she did cease her glaring at their worried hostess.

“Yes, of course; let me grab it and collect myself a bit,” Alchemy replied, entering the next door into the kitchen just to put space between herself and the daedra. Bottles clinked and she haphazardly handed Lloyd two glasses with only a small bit of water in them. “I’m sure you heard, but my name is Alchemy, by the way,” she told Tammaeroth while pointing at the water glasses. Without giving thanks, Tammaeroth pulled her helmet off, laid it down on the chair, and began chugging the water greedily. “Oh my…” Alchemy murmured once she got a look of Tammaeroth’s dark, mildly Dunmer-like features and red skin markings. Lloyd realized that the thespian may have never seen a Dremora up close before. Or even at a distance. Or even in a drawing.

Ever so slightly, Lloyd leaned forward toward the doorway to the kitchen, strategically keeping his feet in place but poking his head inside. Alchemy walked around the frame, and though Tammaeroth wiggled her wrist in his grip, she was too busy drinking both her water and his to truly pay attention. Alchemy sighed, folded her arms, and just stared at him.

“I swear, she’s friendly,” he whispered swiftly and without pause. “I absolutely assure you of that. She’s been a kind and loyal protector the whole way here.”

“What happened to your clothes?” Alchemy asked with both concern as well as a slightly scolding tone. “Did she do this to you?”

“No, she didn’t,” he replied, though he stopped short of mentioning the details of how they’d met; he didn’t want to scare his hostess with the tale of his near-arrest and capture. “We were attacked by a gryphon on our way here. She saved my life.”

“What! Gryphons don’t…they don’t come near main roads!”

“Well, things sort of fell into place with Tammy as my bodyguard. We obviously can’t travel on the main roads, and I don’t know how to dismiss her, so we had to travel through the wilderness.” Before Alchemy could start asking questions about how he’d acquired a Dremora as a familiar rather than a standard, non-sentient daedra, Lloyd unfurled the gryphon feathers and talons from his belt. “We got these out of the attack, though. It isn’t everyday one comes across a gryphon plume, so I hope this will be an adequate housewarming gift.”

“This isn’t a transaction!” Alchemy replied while refusing the gift; she sounded offended. “I told you that you’re welcome back any time, and…” Finished drinking, Tammaeroth pulled her wrist out of Lloyd’s hand and returned to stare at the high elf again. “Look, it’s late. I’m glad to see you back, and to meet you, Tammy. Normally I’d interrogate the two of you to figure out just how you got here, but it’s past midnight. I suggest you both get some rest and we reconvene in the morning; I can delay my duties until closer to brunch so we can talk.”

“Yes, I think rest is in order for us all, yeah?” Lloyd said while nudging Tammaeroth. Her reaction was delayed, first to stare at Alchemy and second to stare at a half-eaten bean pie on the kitchen counter. Nodding to Alchemy for remission, Lloyd took the pie with an unknown person’s teeth marks on it and handed it to the daedra. She took the food in one hand and her helmet in the other and began to follow the two mortals. “And I’m sorry that we woke you up at this hour, Alchemy; I swear, our original plan before the gryphon attack would have had us arriving earlier.”

“I’m just glad that you and your friend are okay,” the high elf said while leading them toward a lonely hallway full of doors to storage rooms; at the end was a miserable, windowless cubbyhole of a room with a couch and a crate. “I’m actually sorry that this is the only accommodation have for you, but our intake has been high lately. All recruits are as discreet as usual, I assure you.” She ushered the two of them in, noticeably leaning away when Tammaeroth brushed past her. “There’s bedding inside of the crate, along with a copious amount of socks; do rest up as much as you can. I’m sure there’s a lot you’ll need to tell me in the morning.”

The way she paused at the end spoke volumes. Alchemy clearly knew that things were amiss, and the fact that she’d even let them in the door without knowing why was an act of generosity. Lloyd hoped he’d be able to honor that. “We’re looking forward to it,” he replied, bidding Alchemy farewell as the door was shut. He turned to Tammaeroth, finding her irritated and drowsy. “This is going to work out for us, I promise.”

On instinct, Tammaeroth locked the door before she started removing pieces of her armor, leaving Lloyd to open the crate and set up two sleeping spots on the floor with blankets and couch cushions. “You must keep your promise to me if you want the people in this house to survive,” she said casually and without anger or threat.

“I’ve kept all promises so far, haven’t I?” he chuckled despite his exhaustion.

“You have so far,” she replied while continuing to remove her armor. Her eyes met his. “Don’t disappoint me.”

He paused in his making of their makeshift beds. “Never,” he replied softly.

The intimacy of their arrangement struck her only at those words. Stripping down to their underclothes, sleeping together in an actual room with actual sheets, all coalesced into one awkward mess for her. Her body markings fluctuated and she blushed, abruptly turning away from him as she finished undressing, ate more than half the leftover pie, and slipped beneath her covers with her back facing him.


	21. Up to Speed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief reunion for Alchemy fans. Her quest line was so touching in the Summerset expansion, so I hope that I can do her justice in her little arc of this story.
> 
> Also, a bit of useless yet fun fluff at the beginning.

The early morning activity in the House of Reveries initially woke Lloyd up; his hunger and thirst ensured that he stayed awake. Muscles aching from two days of travel by foot, he spent a great deal of time shifting his weight around beneath the covers, stretching as much as he could without disturbing Tammaeroth as she rested on his arm-

He froze. Until that moment, he’d kept his eyes closed as he tried to fall back sleep in futility. So groggy had he been that he hadn’t even noticed their respective sleeping positions, or how she’d shifted at night. They’d both fallen asleep while facing away each other, her on the left and him on the right. Somehow, at some point, they’d both turned a quarter diagonally, kicked his pillow out of sight, and ended up sleeping flat on their backs, him on the left and her on the right, his head on her pillow and her head on his arm. He could feel the skin of her wrist in his hand when he finally focused on their position rather than trying to sleep. She felt so soft…how she could be so rough in battle was a contradiction that drove him mad.

Unable to turn his head without disturbing her, he stared at the ceiling, listened to the sound of house members warming up, and wondered how long he could lay there with her in that room and just pretend that the mess which was the outside world didn’t exist.

The answer was two minutes and thirty four seconds.

“Good morning, you two,” said Alchemy from the other side of the door. She sounded much perkier than she had last night. “I have two masks for new hopefuls ready; I know you’re not auditioning, but you’ll need to keep these on at all times. Are you awake, by the way?”

Tammaeroth stirred, initially rolling over toward Lloyd. Their blanket was mostly at their feet, leaving only their underclothes covering them, and he finally felt the physique he’d so far only seen when she unconsciously laid her arm over his body. As her wrist slipped out of his hands, he felt his arm freed along with the desire to wrap it around her. He didn’t, though; she was unconscious, unable to signal to him what she wanted and didn’t want, and it felt wrong. Resisting that desire sapped all the willpower he had, and when her forehead and nose rested against his cheek, he couldn’t move. Her hand hugged around his waist, lightly resting on his obliques as he felt her breath tickle his jaw. Just when her thigh rubbed over the top of his, Alchemy knocked on the door again, and he was woken out of his hazy stupor when Tammaeroth opened her eyes and dug her nails into his waist as a reaction to her awkward panic.

“Ow!”

“Are you two okay in there?” Alchemy asked.

Rolling away so fast that she banged her head on the couch, Tammaeroth scrambled to the door without a word. In one fell sweep, she pulled her chest plate on, snatched up her sabatons, and opened the door.

“Oh!” Alchemy gasped when faced with the daedra she’d met mere hours prior. “I mean, good morning Tammy. Here, I brought a spare robe - it’s all I could find for the time-“

Without even thanking her, Tammaeroth snatched the mask and robe, tossed her sabatons back in the room, and walked directly to the lavatory across the hall. Before Alchemy could begin judging the Dremora even more harshly than she already was, Lloyd snuffed out his fantasies and composed himself.

“Please excuse her brevity,” he said while rising, though Alchemy was staring at the lavatory door. “She felt shy when you were willing to take us in without stereotyping her. She’s beyond words.”

Lloyd was a poor actor, and Alchemy was an excellent analyst, so he could only stray so far from the truth before risking exposure. Fortunately, his improvised story was close enough to the truth that he spoke with conviction. She handed him the mask once he’d donned his torn, sleeveless robe and waited for him to finish.

Brief herself, Alchemy straightened up like the head mistress at an uptight boarding school. “Kitchen. Now.” Her tone of voice left no room for discussion, and he shut the door before following her down the hall and near the breakfast counter. The room was empty, and even Mead, the House’s resident cook, had already taken his leave; it truly was late in the morning.

Alchemy walked around to the other side of the counter and sat without offering him any of the remaining food. The way she looked at him was firm; not stern, but firm. “Why don’t you take a seat,” she said slowly, “and tell me what’s actually going on.” She motioned toward the chair opposite her, interrogating him in a way that she never had in the whole time he’d known her.

Lloyd sat down. “Will you allow me any pleasantries first?”

She shook her head, and he could sense the good nature beneath the mask even when she was pressuring him. “No, but you may flatter me as much as you want afterward. Remember: I’m responsible for what goes on in this house. I need to know what’s happening in this house in order to manage it. And from what I can tell, there is a story of sorts explaining how you and Tammy arrived here in the middle of the night, on foot, without luggage or spare clothes, hungry, exhausted, and dehydrated.” She slid a cup of water over to him. “Drink that, then begin.”

Doing as he was told, he nursed the water as slowly as he could, realizing only then how thirsty he’d been. Then he realized that he hadn’t been wearing his mask. Then he realized that his hostess had folded his hands like an abbey nun ready to wrap him on the knuckles, and he hadn’t even thought of a believable story yet.

Before she could clear her throat, he decided to give her a reasonable interpretation on a whim. “I have an idea. I’ll give you the basic steps that lead me here, and you have the right to ask for any details you wish. Does that sound like a good way to explain our unplanned visit?”

“That’s probably best, but I need to ask before you even start: are you alright?”

“What? Yes, we’re fine now. We’re not actually hurt.”

She already seemed suspicious of his claim, but not enough to question him so soon into his explanation. “You make me worried about you, but okay,” Alchemy said cautiously. “So what happened?”

“Let me organize the steps in my mind…I guess it’s like this,” he sighed, his mind racing at light speed to sort out which details he could safely tell her and which would freak her out too much. “I witnessed a crime committed by smugglers, Tammy saved me, I can’t summon or unsummon her at will, the city guards mistook me for a smuggler, so we hiked here for two days and two nights because I’m afraid that I won’t be able to reasonably explain all of this to the authorities.”

Her response was swift. “How did the guards think you were a smuggler?” she asked. Her tone was sincere, and she may have wanted to believe him, but her sense of tall tales subconsciously guided her to the only part of his story that was an outright lie - and thus the weakest link.

“That’s an interesting detail, see…two of the smugglers attacked me, so Tammy and I retaliated. They…died, but I swear that wasn’t my intention.” When Alchemy didn’t interrupt him or visibly react to the detail of people dying, he breathed easily and continued. “She and I fled the scene, but two city guards witnessed us fleeing, so they probably put two and two together.”

“So wait…did they or did they not see you next to the deceased?”

“They didn’t see us directly next to the dead bodies, no; they just saw us running away. I’m certain that there’s been a, uh, misunderstanding since then.”

Patient and alert, Alchemy nodded and paused, though less dramatically than she normally did. “That’s interesting because we just got word of a street fight in Alindor which occurred two days ago,” she said, causing his heart to freeze in momentary fright. “There were multiple deaths, including two guards, as well as destruction of property in the immigrant quarter.”

Striving as hard as he could to conceal his minor panic, he tried to share as many half-truths as he could to keep the darker details hidden. “What? I didn’t see any guards involved in the brawl,” he said, leaving out the fact that Tammaeroth had killed two justiciars (who aren’t technically guards). And though he knew that the Dark Seducer had killed guards, he hadn’t actually seen that with his own eyes. “Some crazy thugs with their faces covered, young and I think immigrants, chased us,” he explained while leaving out the fact that Tammaeroth had also killed many of the Stendarr zealots, “but I didn’t see any guards involved. This sounds worse than I thought.”

She leaned across the table, her voice laced with concern. “Lloyd…you’re really mixed up in trouble.”

“I know…I’m sorry. I don’t want you or anybody here involved in this.” He took a deep breath, preparing an offer which terrified him but was compelled by guilt. “If you ask, I’ll leave right now-“

“What? No, you’re crazy! You’re not going anywhere. Not you, and not Tammy.”

“Alchemy, are you sure about this? I asked for one night of sleep, and I feel bad enough about that. I don’t want anybody here to get hurt.”

Her next words were music to his ears. “We’re friends, Lloyd. Even if it’s been…divines, six months, almost? Even if it’s been a while, you helped me and Rinny so much; I can’t let you continue in the miserable state you’re in. If you tried to leave right now, I’d tie you to a chair.”

“Oh…you’re very kind, Alchemy. You’re sure that the house won’t be tied to what happened in any way?”

“Not as long as you and Tammy lay low. Especially Tammy…I enchanted her mask such that her voice will sound like a mortal’s. It’s probably best if the two of you stay indoors; you need to lay low for a while. And don’t feel bad about staying…I’m putting you both to work. The attic and the basement are both full of stage props that have been disorganized since forever. Congratulations on your positions as the House of Reveries janitors. At least until the heat dies down.”

He smiled and felt a bit shy, almost as if he were channeling Tammaeroth. He’d burned all his bridges in Alindor, lost all of his money and belongings, committed and aided in murder and assault, and worst of all, he’d lied to Alchemy about quite a few details. His guilt didn’t leave him for what he was doing, but his desperation finally made itself known to him for the first time once he’d actually said the altered story out loud.

“You’re doing more than repaying me, Alchemy,” he said quietly. “I understand that you don’t mind, but I still feel like a burden.”

“All the more reason to get to work, then!” she chortled. So did he.

“You know how to direct people’s feelings in constructive ways.”

“It’s my job, Lloyd. Now, let’s not linger on this; positive thoughts, positive actions. Here.” She took a few plates of leftover breakfast and slid it across the table to him. “I need to see to my duties again; I’ll likely be busy until the late afternoon. I trust that you can bring Tammy up to speed and show her around the house. And please, be sure that the two of you have creative identities for yourselves; there’s no telling how long the two of you will be here, so you’ll need to ensure that nobody remembers you from your last stint here. And that nobody realizes she’s a real, actual daedra and not a Dunmer pretending to be one-“

“What the hell happened to my voice!” Tammaeroth yelled from down the hall.


	22. Breakfast at Alchemy’s

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of development for the path of these two as they find some room to breathe.
> 
> There’s also a bit of my own headcanon for Alchemy here. Since I never consider my RP/fanfic characters to be the Vestige/Dragonborn/chosen one/main hero, I added a bit of an original touch to Lloyd’s past with everybody’s favorite thespian.

Lloyd and Alchemy both jumped at the sound of the unusual voice from down the hall. Not unusual due to any sort of demonic harmony in the sound, but rather, the lack thereof. Tammaeroth’s voice had always sounded, like that of all Dremora, similar to triplets speaking in unison. All of a sudden, one of those triplets sounded like she’d been separated from the others and was speaking alone. Her voice was still pleasant to hear - both in its normal and altered state - but he wasn’t used to hearing her in such a…mortal tone of voice.

Not wanting to tax their hostess’ generosity so early, he swiftly hopped off his chair. “I think she’s not used to hearing her voice like that. Plus, she’s still groggy. I’ll calm her.”

Alchemy didn’t rise from her chair, though. “I’m sure our world is unfamiliar to her,” the high elf replied with a caution which made Lloyd nervous. “But if she’s so dutifully guarding you, I’m sure that you can help her to adjust and adapt. See if you can bring her here; I do have to get to work, but I’d like to more properly introduce myself. It wouldn’t be polite to just disappear on her.”

He almost sighed but stopped himself at the last second. “Right, that makes sense…just a second.” He walked out of the kitchen and then ran down the hall, meeting an unmasked, visibly agitated Tammaeroth outside of the lavatory.

The Dremora had worn the drab, oak-colored monk’s robes which Alchemy had given her, held loosely with a tassel at the waist. The fabric was designed for someone with a rather different frame, for while it hung loosely around her joints, it was too short. Half of her forearms and shins were visible, giving her the look of a big sister wearing an overweight younger sibling’s clothes. One fist was on her hip, giving a very personal signal of displeasure. It was both worrying and endearing at the same time, and he fought off a smile to avoid any misunderstanding.

“It’s a bit short on you, but you wear it well,” he said quietly.

His tone of voice had a subconscious effect; she still looked unhappy, but her response was also relatively quiet. “Lloyd, what is this…” She stopped flapping the mask around when his compliment registered. “I wear…what?” She actually shook her head as if she were trying to make something fall off of it. “I’m being serious…and…thanks…and…what is this?” She waved the mask around violently, causing him to reach out and steady her hand.

“Careful, our disguises are delicate.”

Her face softened out of her scowl and into what could be described as mild inconvenience. “Disguises?” she asked.

“Yes, Alchemy has given us these so we can hide from the justiciars here, and everyone else trying to stop us from getting off the island. It’s safe here…we’ll have food, shelter, and work for a few days until people think we already left or just quit caring.” He took his own mask in his free hand to demonstrate. “These are Alchemy’s way of welcoming us. See, she really can make this all easier for you, right?”

Tammaeroth looked at his mask and then hers with only the slightest hint of hesitation in her eye. Perhaps she was still distrusting of all mortals except for him, but on the face of it, even she couldn’t deny the obvious benefits of accepting Alchemy’s help. She couldn’t linger on the topic for too long, though, because soon enough the Altmer in question was calling up the hall.

“Tammy, I’ll need to take my leave shortly; just a quick word before I do so?”

For the first time in half a year, Lloyd donned a House of Reveries mask. Breathing was significantly easier than he’d remembered, though he’d need time to get used to wearing one all the time again. He felt a slight tickle at his fingers as he adjusted it, and his hand twitched when he realized that it was another hand. Once he had the mask on evenly, he saw Tammaeroth pulling her hand away sheepishly.

“I was trying…the angle was off,” she mumbled while putting her own mask on as an excuse not to finish her sentence.

He continued speaking to let her play it off (it wasn’t wrong or weird anyway) and nodded for her to walk to the kitchen with him. “Let’s not keep her waiting; she’s a busy lady,” he said before leaning in to whisper. “If she asks, then you’re just my bodyguard because I’m falsely suspected of a crime. Don’t give any details beyond that because I kind of sort of didn’t tell her the truth, and I don’t want to mix up the story.”

Tammaeroth merely hummed her affirmation and walked to the kitchen with him. Alchemy was still sitting there, outwardly patient but leaning forward just enough such that Lloyd knew she was pressed for time. He pulled the chair out for Tammaeroth, who seemed confused by his action at first. She understood and sat down when he patted the back of the chair but stared back at him again puzzlingly when he pushed the chair in for her. At first, she watched him as he went to get a second chair for himself, but Alchemy was in enough of a hurry to pass her a plate of uneaten breakfast and start talking.

“So Tammy, welcome to the House of Reveries. Lloyd will get you up to speed on how our days are managed here, but in short, I just want to say that I’m very grateful for what you’ve done.”

The sudden thanks from a stranger had the opposite effect on the Dremora that it would have had on a mortal. Rather than being flattered, Tammaeroth’s posture locked up suspiciously, so much so that the shift was visible in her shoulders. Lloyd noticed it, which most certainly meant that Alchemy would notice it, so he deftly pretended to push her chair and make room for himself to scoot closer to the counter. Tammaeroth’s attention monetarily shifted from the Altmer to the Breton, thankfully giving the impression that she’d tensed up due to him moving her chair.

“Lloyd told me that you saved his life, both in Alinor and on your way here,” Alchemy continued. “He’s an old friend of mine, and I’d rather not have him in a jail cell somewhere, or in a gryphon’s nest.”

Less suspicious but closed off from a mortal stranger, Tammaeroth relaxed a bit and returned to her usual tight-lipped confidence when dealing with anybody except Lloyd. “It was my duty,” she answered in an almost distant tone.

“That’s a positive attitude to have about one’s work; I hope that you can bring some of that positive energy to the house while you’re here,” Alchemy replied in a warning so veiled that only a handful of people would recognize it for what it was. “Lloyd can fill you in on the house rules and help you to develop your identities while you’re here, but I do want to properly greet you before just disappearing on you. I’m Alchemy, mentor for the new members and well as the hopefuls. We consider this a safe space where people may pursue their true passions in a supportive environment. I want you to make yourselves at home; this is not a place where people will judge you by your past, or whatever labels society out on you. We only judge, and are judged, by the work we do and the effort we contribute to the peace and stability of this house.

“Do you have a positive feeling about your place here, Tammy? I felt safe the moment I saw you with Lloyd,” Alchemy said in a statement which only Lloyd would understand correctly and Tammaeroth would understand in the opposite of its true meaning. “Do you feel that way too?”

Less tense but still distrusting, Tammaeroth looked to Lloyd without subtlety. She seemed to wish he would answer for her, which would defeat the purpose of reassuring Alchemy that she hadn’t welcomed an uncontrolled, bloodthirsty demon into the house. Beneath the table, he gave her wrist a quick squeeze to reassure her. Despite her slightly dense behavior when it came to social interaction, she understood enough to just agree with whatever a stranger offering help would say.

“My place is suitable,” she replied mechanically.

In any other circumstance, Alchemy would have easily seen through the hesitant platitude. Lucky for a certain sorcerer and daedra, however, the high elf was so pressed for time that she didn’t even seem to fully register the way Tammaeroth had answered. “That’s the spirit, Tammy! I’m glad that you’re accepting of your surroundings.” Alchemy slid her chair back and stood up, flashing Lloyd a sideways glance. “I trust that Lloyd will continue to help you with that.”

“It’s my pleasure, both to help Tammy adapt and to protect the interests of the house,” he replied, again in a veiled answer that only Alchemy understood.

“Right very well then. So.” Alchemy waited for Tammaeroth to see Lloyd stand and follow suit, then bowed to the two of them. “I’ll see you both around dinner time tonight; I’ll need you to have your new names and life histories to match the masks. Practice them with the hopefuls and provide general assistance where you can because the real work won’t begin until tomorrow morning.”

“Really, Alchemy, we can’t thank you enough,” Lloyd said while bowing back. Tammaeroth bowed in tandem with him. “You’re a guardian angel.”

Though she’d already turned to the opposite door, Alchemy leaned a little bit closer. “You were mine, once.” She turned toward Tammaeroth and said: “ask him about that when you’re done. He knows what I mean.”

When Alchemy held and waited, Tammaeroth understood the comment to be a tag statement. “Okay,” was all she managed to think of to say.”

With that, Alchemy took her leave, and the pair sat back down at the breakfast counter in the empty kitchen. Lloyd pulled more plates of leftover breakfast to the two of them. “She likes you, trust me,” he said while waving a saucer of jam at Tammaeroth. “It means a lot to her that you’ve been protecting me.”

“Why does this person take such interest in you? Will she interfere when I take you toward Shimmerene?” the daedra asked.

“What? No, no, Alchemy would never interfere in another person’s wishes.” He could see the paranoid tension growing in Tammaeroth’s shoulders already and reached out to lay a hand on the back of her chair. She arched her back and stared at his arm in reaction, very much disarmed by the simple act. “I was here after a show once, after one of Alchemy’s performances. A crowd gathered to greet members of the house afterward, and some nut job who’d had too much to drink kept saying that he loved her. When people in the crowd got uncomfortable, he got aggressive and tried to touch her. Old experience as a guard kicked in and I stood in front of the guy. He actually stabbed me in the torso, but I put him in a headlock until the local police arrived.”

“You took a knife for a stranger?” Tammaeroth asked. She didn’t seem confused so much as surprised by the backstory.

Lloyd shrugged. “I can’t dish it out well, as you’ve seen, but I can sure take it. Anyway, Alchemy isn’t used to violence and was really shaken by the event; she’d never have a fan scare her before. The guy apparently had pages of drawings of her at his apartment. They shipped him to prison off-island, and I became good friends with literally the whole House of Reveries after that.” Tammaeroth listened very closely to his every word, and as much as he’d have liked to continue that personal connection, he had to assure Tammaeroth that they were safe and himself that she wouldn’t hurt anybody. “Do you see what I mean when I say that she can help us? We really could benefit from laying low for a while.”

Tammaeroth nodded in earnest. “That’s a logical escape tactic.”

“Good, good. Now…” Lloyd pulled over the rest of the unfinished breakfast over to the two of them. “Let’s eat.”

As the two of them dug in, she continued to look at his arm on the back of her chair from time to time. Her duality enthralled him: she was so confident when speaking about her mission and tactics and conflict, yet was still coming out of her shell when it came to personal connection. He didn’t push her, nor did he mock her, but he adored the way he saw her working to be more than a ruthless killing machine by her own free will.

“Lloyd?”

“Hmm?”

She finished a mango and stared at the plate. Her chin tilted toward him, but he could see the shyness through the eyeholes of her mask. Still, she pushed herself after taking a few seconds to awkwardly look from his dish to hers. “Last night, you didn’t call me by my full name…you used a nickname.”

“Yes, Tammy. It seemed befitting and, well, more personal.”

Her whole face turned away from him, and she cradled a glass of iced tea in her hand, idly turning it around and around. She took a deep breath she hadn’t intended him to hear as she measured her words. “You called me by a nickname,” she said a bit nervously. “And you used it in front of your friend, and it’s not my full name. It’s a nickname, and you used it spontaneously, and in front of your friend. And…” She cleared her throat. “I liked it when you said that.”

Before he could even react, she pulled her mask halfway up her head, concealing her eyes, and gulped down the tea. She left the mask covering her eyes as they finished breakfast in silence. He smiled and looked down at his own glass, content to enjoy their meal and let her recover from her comment.


	23. Naming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One who overthinks, and one who underthinks, both brainstorming secret identities while they lay low for a while. Leasing frustration ensues.

After a silent breakfast, Lloyd had persuaded Tammaeroth to return to the little closet they’d been given as their quarters. Protest as she might about her desire to scout the building and devise an escape plan just in case, she eventually agreed to go back after he’d asked for the fourth time. Once inside, they’d taken their masks off - they’d both take time getting used to wearing those - and cleaned up the bedding of cast down towels and blankets the best they could.

She remained standing by the door even when he sat on the couch. “The door is locked; there’s no need to stand guard,” he said while waving her over.

She shook her head. “I don’t know this place.”

“We’re safe, I’m telling you. It’s okay to let your guard down sometimes.”

“No,” she replied automatically.

“Come on, we can’t go back outside until we work on our alibi.”

“No. Our what?”

“Our backstory,” he replied while waving for her to join him on the couch. “Everybody here leaves behind their old identities. The House of Reveries is completely anonymous - that’s why it’s so safe. That’s why I wanted us to stop here.”

“No.”

“What are you even saying ‘no’ to?” he chuckled light heartedly.

Arms folded and posture alert, she tried to give the impression of reluctance. The lack of tension in her shoulders, however, gave away her desire to sit. “It’s never okay to let one’s guard down,” she said despite the fact that she went to sit down anyway.

She kept her arms folded even while sitting, though the two of them were facing each other as they leaned against the arm rests. In one of her inactive moments, she finally seemed at rest as she sat, quietly hugging herself and examining the slippers she’d been given. Lucky for her, they were her size, unlike the robe. In the position she’d sat, the folds of the fabric stopped at her elbows and knees, revealing the crimson markings which matched her ash complexion so well. Lloyd looked down at his own clothes as they sat…he looked so terrible in comparison. He was still wearing the battered brown robe he’d left Alinor in, torn sleeves and all.

They spent a few minutes just sitting and resting their aching muscles. Tammaeroth looked so pleasant when she wasn’t on the alert; he’d only seen that comfortable demeanor from her twice. He kept his mouth shut and left her to bask in that feeling for quite some time. Even with so much on his mind, he wondered about what had led her to simultaneously be both so tolerant of him yet so devoted to a military code which she resented. Her mind didn’t seem busy - she was truly at ease. Maybe that moment on the couch, as the two of them sat together, was the first moment in decades when the daedra warrior had actually rested without looking over her shoulder.

Eventually, they heard activity elsewhere in the house; proper members of the House of Reveries must have returned from rehearsals. To Lloyd’s surprise, Tammaeroth didn’t react with hostility at the sound of people she didn’t know. She merely looked up at him expectantly after however long they’d spent trying to recuperate.

“Shall we devise our fake identities now?” he asked.

“I think so.”

“Alright. Let me share with you how it works here, and then we can develop our new names together. Basically, people take on names representing characteristics they’re known for, or adjectives they feel describe their new personas. Only Alchemy knows people’s real names and backgrounds here, and she’d never, ever tell. People are born again here.”

“So we need to make up stories,” Tammaeroth said.

“Yes, that’s the ticket. And they need to be far from the reality. People can change themselves magically, yeah?”

Tammaeroth sighed. “Alright. I guess my alibi is…that I’m a dark elf,” she said with a measure of disdain.

“Oh…are you sure? People might assume that’s your real identity,” he said while trying to be delicate. “Do you think it would be better to pretend to be something other than what they think you are?”

She loosened her arms and stopped hugging herself, looking rather proud of her idea. “A dark elf is other than what I am,” she confidently replied.

“Yes, but, what I’m saying…okay, think of it like this. People will see your skin color, and won’t they assume that you’re a dark elf based on that?”

“Yes, it’s the perfect alibi.”

“What? Look, look.” He leaned forward and tried to think of how he could express his idea, especially when she was so content with what she was saying. “The alibi needs to be different from the reality, right?”

Any trace of a scowl disappeared from her face, and though she didn’t smile, she gave him a neutral, almost soft look. “A dark elf is different from my reality,” she said with a hint of amusement.

“Yes, but the people don’t know that, see? They’ll look at you and think that you’re an actual dark elf wearing a mask.”

Though she still seemed content, there was a measure of confused resignation in the way she shrugged. “Let’s tell them that I’m a Dremora, then.”

He did a double take, to her further amusement. “Wait, are you serious?”

“Yes. They’ll never guess that I’m actually a Dremora if they think I’m an elf.”

This time, it was Lloyd’s turn to pause and stare at his shoes. “That’s so simple that it’s smart.”

“Thank you,” she replied. Without realizing it, she let her full lips pull into a smile contagious in its contentment. She smiled so infrequently that, when she finally did, he nearly forgot what hers chosen alibi had been. After a few seconds, she noticed him watching her reaction and they both looked away. Her arms remained loosely folded, though, and she cleared her throat and actually restarted the discussion on her own. “Simplicity is good. Complexity leads to…trouble.”

Her typically cryptic statement hinting at untold years of a hellish lifestyle in Oblivion was alluring, and he almost dragged their conversation off-topic before stopping himself. “We need to figure out a name for you, too,” he said.

Missing his point, she waved her hand with an air of confidence that was as relieving to see from her as it was misplaced. “I already told you, I like ‘Tammy.’ It’s nice.”

“Yes, but…that’s different from what we need. ‘Tammy’ is what everybody will think is your real name.”

“That’s why it’s perfect. Simple, no?”

“No…I mean, yes, it’s simple, but there has to be another name. Everybody in the House of Reveries adopts a moniker which describes their adopted personalities as artists-“

“Vengeance,” she said with relish.

“…as artists…um…what artistic pursuit relates to vengeance?”

Casual as he’d never seen her, she reclined back and rested her head in her hand. “Vengeful painter?” she said, almost smiling again. She seemed to enjoy the process more than figuring out an actual name.

He would rush her and found himself smiling as he looked up at the ceiling. “Everybody here uses one name only. Can you combine those?”

“Revenge-painter.”

“I don’t think that’s really a word.”

“Hatemonger.”

“Mongers are merchants, not artists.”

“Distaste.”

“That’s…no,” he said, eliciting a quick, funny snort from her as she smiled again.

“Bitterness.”

“Only if you can cook bitter food.”

“Hellchild.”

“What?”

“Soulcrusher.”

“Are you serious?”

“Mindsmasher.”

“I’m trying to-“

“Aedraslayer.”

“Tammaeroth, plea-“

“Torment.”

“Tammy!”

At the sound of her nickname, she stopped and folded her arms in front of herself again. When he looked down from the ceiling, he noticed her eyes focused on her shoes again and the same pretty smile returned to her face. Was she…joking?

Rather pleased with herself, she raised a hand to partially cover her mouth while the slightest shift in her body markings came and went. “Dreamkiller,” she said while forcibly maintaining a straight face. She continued fiddling nervously with her mouth, her hair, her robe collar, or whatever until she caught him smiling at her again. Even when nervousness creeped into her body language again, she didn’t hide her amusement from him. “Dreamkiller?” she asked, unsuccessfully suppressing a smile on and off.

“Dreamer,” he replied. “Do you like that one?”

She pulled a lock of hair and twirled it in front of her face shyly, though she retained her composure. “Yes. It’s general enough…I don’t want to do any real art.”

“Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. Not everybody here is a painter or an actor - the stage hands and builders are also masked members.” He paused for a moment before sitting up. “I forgot, we already have a job. We have to arrange and take stock of the basement and attic. Props, costumes, plywood, knick knacks, whatever is in there needs to be organized.” To his surprise, she began smiling again. This time, she didn’t turn away shyly. He felt his own smile invading his face uncontrollably as he realized that she was smiling directly at him. “What?”

Though she still played with her hair, she kept her hand at the side of her head instead of trying to conceal her face. Like a mortal and unlike any daedra he’d encountered, she seemed to be growing more comfortable the more time they spent around each other. “I want to give you a nickname,” she said after only a split second of hesitation.

“Let’s hear it,” he chuckled.

“Talker,” she said with a sincere, non-mocking smile. “Because you talk a lot.”

He hid the bruise she’d slapped onto his pride. “Oh, I…do I?”

“Yes, but I guess that’s not art. Maybe you should be called Painter.”

“I don’t paint, though. It’s also a little too generic, isn’t it?”

“Alright. Reader?”

“That’s not art,” he replied with a quizzical look.

“Depth. You read about deep subjects.”

“That’s not self evident, though, is it?”

“Puzzle, because your reading list is difficult to understand.”

“I like that better,” he replied, “but can we make it slightly more artsy?”

“Labyrinthine.”

“I think that’s the name of a place.”

“Labyrinth.”

“Well, isn’t that the same-“

“Parade.”

“What?”

“Paradox.”

He paused, both to breathe at the end of their exchange as well as to consider what she’d suggested. “I like it,” he replied. “Thanks for the new name, Tammy.”

She looked down at her shoes shyly again and nodded. “You’re welcome, Paradox.” Finally showing a bit of initiative, she actually straightened up on the couch first. “Now that we have names, I wouldn’t mind exploring the area. We need to know all entrances and exits in case we’re attacked.

Glad that she was comfortable enough to make a suggestion that didn’t involve just leaving for Shimmerene immediately, he stood up with her and followed suit. “Absolutely,” he replied as they donned their masks.


	24. Mental Block

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even though this whole chapter takes place at a dinner table, I had a lot of fun writing it. This little interlude will be my experiment in building plot without action and questing.

After several hours of slinking around the House of Reveries and mapping every inch of the building, the Breton and the Dremora had sat down for a late dinner in the house’s kitchen. Alchemy never did come to see them again, apparently having been caught up with her mentees elsewhere in Rellenthil. Though Lloyd missed seeing Alchemy again, he was grateful - for Tammaeroth’s sake - that nobody else stopped by to speak to them yet, either.

Tammaeroth spent their meal at a bench in the back of the kitchen jumping and stiffening at every sound, every new voice, and ever slip of a shadow. The unfamiliar household environment seemed to take its toll on her nerves, much to the chagrin of them both. In one particular moment, a large group of extroverted members of the house noisily passed by the kitchen on their way upstairs, causing Tammaeroth to square her shoulders and grip her fork tightly. Sympathetic to the stress she seemed to be experiencing, Lloyd put his hand around hers, causing her to stiffen awkwardly but from a different source. He didn’t enjoy making her uncomfortable, but he’d rather have her glance at him confusedly than have her stab someone to death with a fork.

She leaned toward him expectantly. “Those are full members. I think they sleep in the second bunk room in the east wing,” he whispered to her. “They’re not intruders.”

Distracted to an extent, she let her shoulders loosen up. “Right from the stairwell, twelve paces down,” she murmured while her eyes darted between Lloyd and the kitchen doorway. “I have their location. Their noise level is unhelpful.”

“You know, Rellenthil has a surprisingly low crime rate,” Lloyd replied while letting go of her hand. Still lacking in subtlety, she stared at his hand for a few seconds. He casually scooped up more of the leftovers and scraps left by all the others who’d arrived before them and played it off. “I mean, I’m only assuming that you’re worried the noise could attract the attention of enemies. I could be very wrong in that assumption, now that I think about it.”

Looking back up at him as she slowly loosened her grip on the fork, she seemed placated even when a residue of paranoia remained in her darting eyes behind her mask. “You were correct, actually. The loud laughing, the lack of situational awareness…it feels dangerous to me.” She fumbled with her mask as she pulled it up slightly to swallow a spoonful of chicken pot pie, then slipped it back on. “I don’t like it. I want to get off this island.”

Humming his acknowledgment, he fell quiet while the two of them continued to eat for a while. Only a few other people remained in the kitchen - two members sitting alone at other tables, the Nord cook named Mead stacking the dishes near the sink. After the pair had finished most of their food, Lloyd spoke again.

“What comes after?” he asked absentmindedly.

Tammaeroth stopped chewing. “What?” she asked, craning her neck to look at him.

“After we get off the island,” he said in a lower volume. “Will Hermaeus Mora really let me pass through Oblivion and back into Nirn?”

Paranoia marked her eyes as she looked all around. Nobody paid them any mind, and they clearly weren’t being monitored, but she was most definitely taken aback by the return to a subject he’d only asked her about days prior.

As if she were compelled, she finally opened up a bit more, however much it taxed her sense of secrecy. “I was told that you must return to Nirn; you don’t have any choice in this matter. Neither do I.” She started chewing her food even faster, but she continued peering at him sideways; she knew he’d push for more information.

“Well, it doesn’t seem nefarious. I can say that much. Other princes from the planes might demand that I remain as a servant or prisoner in their realms; Hermaeus Mora seems to be providing safe passage. That’s beneficial to me personally, though I don’t know ho he benefits from this.”

Gears proverbially turned in her head, and he left her alone to her thoughts. After an inappropriately long period of time, during which one of the full members of the house left to sleep, Tammaeroth just resumed the conversation like a mere second had passed.

“I don’t either. I only know that I must keep you safe while you exit. Laying low here is a strategically sound choice, but I don’t want to remain for so long that we become discovered or compromised.”

“At the risk of sounding ignorant, is there a time limit on your mission?” he asked. “Or a time limit which would make sense to me as a mortal?”

She shook her head at him. “No. And yes and no.”

He paused in his meal. “What’s the second part about?”

“Time. Time making sense to you.” Without concealment or tact, she reached over to his small bowl of carrot soup, scooped up a bit of it, and drank it. She fumbled to get her enchanted mask back on. “Don’t believe other daedra when they claim that time in realms of Oblivion are incomprehensible to you. Either time is flexible but linear enough to be understood by us and you, or it’s beyond the understanding of us both. Our minds aren’t as superior to yours as we think…” She stopped herself in mid sentence and stared down at her plate. “I’m not supposed to tell you that.”

Rather than uncomfortable, she merely seemed tired. They were both tired, of course, from the days of hiking and lack of sleep, but she suddenly seemed mentally tired as well. His curiosity was screaming at him, compelling him to push for more, but he didn’t want to coerce her. He tried to be direct.

“It’s okay. I won’t lie…I really do want to know. My studies have focused on Oblivion and its place in cosmology. But if this topic will land you in hot water with your lord or anything else, then we can drop it.”

Laying her spoon down and resting her head in her hand, she displayed a strange yet alluring mixture of weary reluctance and disappointed desire in the way her shoulders slumped, her eyes cast down, and her stiffness dissipated. “There’s nobody to punish me for this, but…we’re just not supposed to talk to mortals about ourselves. Resistance to that rule is difficult because it’s ingrained. I…I don’t know. I don’t even really know what I’m saying right now.”

Her melancholy demeanor, as pretty as it was in its own tragic way, infected him to a greater extent than he’d wanted for either of them. He turned toward her and forced himself to speak with more energy in his voice despite his drowsiness. “Hey, I think I get it. Maybe there are better words on the tip of your tongue, but the idea is clear. Like you said, our minds aren’t so different from yours, and ingrained rules affect us too. Could I give you an example, and you tell me if it’s correct?”

Head still resting on her hand, she turned to look at him straight; her previous awkwardness was gone, replaced by a weird sort of melancholy clarity brought on by resignation. “I’d like that. To try it.”

“Good, Good. So, I’ll use myself as an example here, and maybe it will match your own situation. Now, I disagree with inherited rule. I disagree with a person being born into money, into power, and keeping it without earning it. I don’t like the concept of nobility, or royalty, or any general nepotism. But you know what? I’m still a Breton, and we love our court politics. When I meet a royal, from any country or culture, I bow to them. It’s ingrained. The people of High Rock are peons and we show deference to bloodlines as if it even matters. And no matter how much I disagree with that, I’m still a part of it; I can’t see a royal and then act as if I’m their equal.

“Does that sound like what you’re feeling when you talk to me about your realms and your kind?”

“Yes,” she replied without her characteristic hesitation. “So much. I have no reason not to answer your questions. You’ve been obedient, and honest, but I feel this block when I try to talk to you about this topic.”

He shrugged. “Well, thank you for telling me what you have so far; you’re under no obligation to indulge by annoying curiosity, though.”

She snorted into her mask, and he imagined that she was smiling beneath. That made two instances in a single day, a record for her. “It’s alright for now,” she said while shrugging back.

Since she seemed so relaxed, he tried to push for just a little more. “So what will you do after your mission is finished?”

That tired, lost aura crept into her demeanor again. “I have no directive in that regard. And to tell you the truth, in my situation, I can’t think that far ahead.” She turned toward him and locked on to him with sleepy eyes. “Don’t ask me about that tonight, please.”

He raised his hands in the air. “You have my word,” he chuckled. This time, he was the one who proved infectious; despite his own fatigue, the energy he’d forced into his words, and his playful gesture, seemed to work. She snorted again and nodded, sitting up straight to finish her meal as well as part of his.

“I’m tired,” she said while he finished his own food. “Is dishwashing part of our job?”

“Yes, unfortunately. We can’t sleep just yet; organization and general housekeeping is included in our duty. Alchemy didn’t say that explicitly, but I know how things go around here.” He finished eating and stood up, noticing that the cook as well as the last other diner had taken their leave. “It’s only us. We may as well get to work.”

He took both of their plates to the sink and got to work, waiting for her to follow. She dragged her feet, exuding dread as she watched him start the service work. Her heavy sigh made him chuckle again. “Undignified,” she mumbled as she joined him in washing the dishes.


	25. Time Change

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A recluse slowly learns to talk to others again, bit by bit.

Having passed out the night before, Lloyd and Tammaeroth both slept deeply and without disturbance in their storage closet turned bedroom. In fact, the usual stirring within the house at the break of dawn didn’t wake them; all that rushed them from their slumber was the insistent wrapping on the door by an unseen visitor.

At first, Lloyd tried to ignore the sound. Though he was technically a guest of their hostess’ generosity, his desire to reciprocate via attentiveness to his duties couldn’t override his desire for just five more minutes. Instead, what woke him up was the feeling of another warm body beneath his arm. His eyes shot open to a view full of Tammaeroth’s jet black hair.

“Hello? Hopefuls?” came the unknown voice from the other side of the door.

Tammaeroth stirred and took a deep breath. Arching her back, she pressed her shoulders into Lloyd’s chest and her buttocks into his lap, exhaling just as deeply while she started to roll over. Lloyd’s mind raced as swiftly as his pulse, and he couldn’t decide whether he should just hold still and leave her to do as she would, or roll away from her to give her space. His mind and body failed to reach a resolution in time, and when she stretched just a little too much, the sensation of his hand over her stomach caused her abs to tighten. In a flash, she rolled over more to see the position they were in and then roll the other way in embarrassment, covering her face with her hands.

“Alchemy sent us with better-fitting clothes,” said a second person from behind the door.

Since Tammaeroth was busy collecting herself from her shock awakening, Lloyd had to answer. “Thank you, thank you so much. Just a moment, please.” He sat up, leaned across the bedding the two of them had set up, and grabbed both of their robes. “Hey, here,” he said while handing her the ill-fitted garment, doing his best to play off what had just happened casually.

Sitting with her back to him, she dropped her hands and accepted the brown robe. “I, yes, I, they, thank,” she mumbled while snatching the robe away, dropping it, and then picking it up again so violently that it swung and wrapped around her wrist.

The two of them dressed and donned their plain white masks before standing next to each other at the door. Tammaeroth reached first and opened the door, revealing two natives of Summerset wearing much more colorful clothing. The two high elves were both holding piles of spare clothes, significantly less ornate than their own but certainly better than Tammaeroth’s seeming hand-me-down gown and Lloyd’s hobo robe.

“I’m Lace,” said one of the two elves, “and this is Thorn.”

“These garments are Lace’s handiwork,” said the man named Thorn.

Lace nodded. “Please accept our-“

True to form, Tammaeroth took the entire pile of clothes from Lace’s hands and took all of it to the bathroom across the hall, saying nary a word. The two elven members of the house stared at the bathroom door in confusion, leaving Lloyd to mend fences once more.

“Dreamer really had to go,” Lloyd chuckled, drawing the attention of the two elves to himself. “Thank you for the clothes, by the way; we lost our own during our journey here.”

Easily consoled, the two elves both shrugged off the frosty introduction. “It’s the least we could do to welcome you. Alchemy told us that the two of you are the only current hopefuls since our previous cohort were all either accepted or rejected last week. You’re both the babies of the Manor, now!”

Lloyd held a hand over his heart. “You flatter us beyond what we deserve, but Paradox won’t stop you!” he chortled. “If breakfast is being served, then perhaps we could meet some of the other members.”

“That’s why we came to wake you,” said Thorn.

Lace nodded a second time. “You just missed Alchemy, but a few of us are just getting started. Mead prepared blue berry pancakes; we’ll try our best to save you some, but don’t tarry!”

“We won’t, we won’t. See you in a few!”

After bidding them farewell, Lloyd took the new clothes back into the bedroom/closet. He removed the torn, tattered robes he’d left Alinor with, glad to finally be rid of a garment which reminded him of the night he’d lost almost every piece which remained of his already disorganized life; he could sell it as recycled fabric to a clothier, along with the gryphon feathers and talons Tammaeroth had scavenged, once they had a break. By the time he’d made up the room and sorted out his new clothes, he heard Tammaeroth exit the bathroom, and he rushed to throw on a beige and khaki outfit reminiscent of an Altmer shopkeeper.

Tammaeroth entered, much less flustered than she’d been before; she was even able to turn to face him once she’d set her clothes down on top of a crate rather than pretending to look at her shoes again. The violet shirt and teal pants she’d worn seemed like a curious clash of colors to him, but the fabric was at least her size. In fact, it fit so well that he was able to see aspects of her physique he’d previously seen only on that disappointing morning on a creek bank days prior.

He almost complimented her on how well she wore the new outfit, but he stopped himself out of fear of flustering her again. “Those two are called Lace and Thorn; they want us to go have breakfast with them and some of the others. Are you hungry?”

She spent a moment eying his outfit before his words registered. “They want to have breakfast, or they want to have breakfast and talk?” Tammaeroth asked.

“Well…yeah, I think they’re interested in meeting us. I made sure to tell them our fake names.”

She sighed, and her eyes looked pleasing, expressing quite a bit from behind the mask. “I don’t feel ready for this.”

“I don’t know what choice we have; we’re guests here, and we don’t want to appear ungrateful. Come on, Tammy, I know you can rise to any challenge before you, whether in battle or not.”

She did a double take at the sound of her nickname, and her shoulders picked up a bit. “Battle is easier than this, though.”

“That makes it all the more challenging, than, doesn’t it?” he asked while walking toward the door. “Right out here, you’re going to be out of your element. A warrior needs to be ready for that at all times, doesn’t she?” She snorted as if smiling again, encouraging him to push a little more. “I can take the lead if you’d like. To be honest, some of them might recognize my voice - I was friends with most of them. It’s been half a year, but some of them might recognize me as that adoring fan who attended their shows regularly for a few weeks. They’ll immediately be predisposed to respect you by association.”

Respect was, apparently, another key word that grabbed her attention. “You really think…we’ll, Lloyd, don’t leave me alone out there. You can’t. You have to stay.”

“I wasn’t planning on leaving!” he chuckled.

“You won’t. You’re not allowed.”

“Yes, I won’t. It’s going to be constructive and healthy, I’m sure of it. Come on now, I’m sure you’ve had conversations with mortals other than me, right?”

He went from using the right keywords to using a wrong one in a matter of seconds. Tammaeroth folded her arms in front of her, and Lloyd realized that he’d dug too deeply into her past again. “I’ve lived alongside mortals other than you,” she said, eyes downcast. “I’m not inexperienced.”

“I apologize, I didn’t mean to be presumptuous.”

“I know you didn’t,” she sighed. “I didn’t think you were being presumptuous. That wasn’t it. It’s just…been a long time.” She fell quiet for a moment, standing without moving for the door. He didn’t know if she was truly dejected so easily, or if she was waiting for another pep talk. His desire to help compelled him to believe the latter.

“Did you live with mortals in Oblivion, or in Mundus?” he asked cautiously.

To his relief, she didn’t sigh again, and her arms loosened. “I met mortals in Oblivion…but I lived with some of them in Mundus. It was…a long time ago.” She lifted her head up and looked to him with similar resignation to what she’d shown him last night. “It’s hard to say, but I think that may have been before you were born.”

“I turned thirty years old last month,” Lloyd replied, and her eyes popped out of her head so much that he thought they might poke out of her mask.

“Oh, yes, this was definitely before you were born. They…” She cleared her throat, similar to what he would do when he was nervous but pushing himself to stop being so. “They died before you were born. They weren’t my friends, but we got along, and our association was good for both me and them. The news of their passing made me unhappy.” She shook her head, and to his surprise, her mood lightened without the need for his motivation. “It’s in the past. Not the far past, but in the past. I see the logic in remaining here for a few days…if you help me, I’ll try to be polite to these people too.”

“I promise that I will. You have my word.” A lull in the conversation was interrupted by his curiosity, and he didn’t follow suit when she nodded toward the door. “Tammy…how old are you? Or, how old are you considered in Nirn time?”

A mortal might have taken offense, especially one as private as Tammaeroth was. Fortunately, she was a daedra, and she was amused by the question. “Nirn time might not help you understand; the number I can give you would be longer than what I experienced from my perspective. Oblivion time is more subjective.”

“Could you humor me?” he asked. He took a step toward the door to avoid pressuring her. “You don’t have to, but would you?”

She hummed to herself, all her previous anxiety excised. “The life I’ve led feels, to me, like a few hundred years. Not even three hundred, even. A mortal in Oblivion would have experienced the same.”

“And in Nirn years?”

“Yes, Nirn time. You know that we aren’t born, we have no parents, but not all daedra existed in the beginning. I arose from the mess of the void, with common knowledge and some vestigial memories shared by banished Dremora, during what you’d call the First Era.”

He fought to contain himself, both because of the amount of time and the fact that a daedra was giving him such firsthand information. “Wow. So…okay. That’s over three thousand years.”

“I didn’t experience it that way,” she said.

“I hear you, I hear you. That’s quite a bit to ponder.”

“I find thirty years a bit to ponder given that you act like an adult,” she replied. She was sincere, and seemed pleasantly surprised when he laughed.

“Maybe we can compare stories once we get to work. For now, we have people waiting on us. But…thank you for sharing that info with me. You’ve led a fascinating life.”

She shook her head congenially as they left. “Trust me, you’re wrong. Just help me pretend that I have fascinating stories now.” More relaxed than he’d seen her in days, she walked with her head up as they went to the kitchen. “Don’t leave me by myself. You can’t.”

“I can’t,” he chuckled along with her. “I don’t want to, don’t worry. We’re in this together.”


	26. Pushed Envelopes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part of being comfortable around someone is the ability to argue politely.

For their entire second day at the House of Reveries, the two of them went through cycles of practicing conversation with the house’s members, taking breaks to learn their way around the building itself, and actually tending to their cleaning duties. To the pleasant surprise of them both, Tammaeroth survived conversations with multiple people in a single day without blanking out, retreating into her shell, or using Lloyd’s real name by accident. Granted, she achieved that social survival by deflecting and misdirecting most questions she was asked back onto him, but even that was an achievement for her. Throughout the day, she’d only gotten angry twice and even shook hands with a stranger. In the evening, Lloyd had almost convinced her to go for a walk outside, though that proved to be a bit much for one day.

On the morning of their third day hiding out in the Manor of Masques, they finally delved into the structure’s basement as they were supposed to. Lloyd almost took his mask off, but Tammaeroth grabbed his hand roughly, still twitching nervously at the contact. “There’s too much dust,” she whispered despite there being nobody to hear them.

Lloyd cast a light spell, illuminating the entire basement to reveal, first and foremost, dust. There were crates, clothing racks, empty shelves and disorganized boxes sitting on the floor, but it was all covered in dust. “If you start to sneeze, I think I can cure the reaction. At least for a while.”

Tammaeroth didn’t react, tutting her tongue at the chaos which was the unused props and costumes of the house members. “There’s no pattern or tactful design to this at all,” she said with disapproval. Her eyes swept back and forth over the breadth of the basement. “I can already see efficient ways to organize everything, but that could take more time than we have before we leave this town.”

“How much time?” Lloyd asked.

Walking among the assorted piles of fabric, wooden objects, and ceramic sculptures, Tammaeroth flicked her fingers around while tallying everything she could see. Her military lifestyle took over while she focused intently on plans for organization, and she only realized that he’d spoken to her a few seconds later. “Hmm? What?”

“How much time would we need to organize this mess?”

“If we pace ourselves the way we did yesterday, accounting for meals, rest, and social diversions, then we’d need three days to clean this place up the way I’m thinking,” she replied instantaneously.

“Three days?” he asked. “I thought we’d stay here a little longer than that.”

Her attention was finally drawn away from the mess in front of them. “What? Why? Lloyd, I can’t delay my mission. You know that.”

“Well…I know in general that you don’t want to delay it, and that you’re not sure what happens thereafter,” he said while reaching for a broom amid a pile of sticks, signposts, and disconnected table legs. She listened intently but also waved her hand to stop him from sweeping the dust around just yet. “I’m not sure why, though. I thought that the passage into Oblivion, this skein, would remain in its place for now.”

“Yes, but there could be danger if we wait for too long!” she replied immediately.

“I can’t argue with that; we could be caught if we wait for too long-“

“Yes!”

“-but how do we define too long?” he finished saying.

“Yes! No, what? It’s…” Upon realizing that she didn’t have an answer, her voice trailed off. “I don’t want to increase the risk of complications any more than its current level. Every extra day is an extra complication.”

“Could I make a suggestion?”

She paused to look at him and leaned back against a crate. Though unaggressive, she appeared rather serious. “Go ahead.”

“Maybe we can agree on a departure time from now. That way, we have a plan; we can also inform Alchemy-“

“You will not inform Alchemy,” Tammaeroth said firmly.

“What? Tammy, that’s not fair. She’s in charge of this house; she needs to know about its occupancy.”

“No.”

“Why not? What possible risk could arise from a person we trust knowing when we’ll leave?”

“No.”

“What the…what are you even saying no to?”

“No, just no.”

“Alright, what’s the reason?”

“I’m in charge and I make the rules!” Tammaeroth said, with a tone so self-assured that she may as well have been observing the blueness of the sky.

When he crooked his neck back at her forcefulness, she paused along with him. A quiet moment passed between them in the basement as they both tried to figure out what to say. As used as Lloyd was to being the less awkward, possibly more mature half of the pair, he struggled to find a way to gracefully change subjects without submitting to arbitrary rules. Tammaeroth continued to lean against the crate, but the way she looked down at her shoes spoke of her awareness of their impasse.

“I have…used the wrong words for what I wanted to say,” she mumbled shyly.

He nearly sighed, stopping himself midway and just holding his breath for a moment. “It’s nothing, don’t worry about it. We’re just trying to work out a plan.”

Her fingers dug into the crate anxiously. “I didn’t mean that you’re my prisoner. I just…I can’t risk failure. Anything I say, I only say it because I want to evacuate you from this island in one piece.”

“I wouldn’t doubt you for a second; it’s just not something I’ve thought about much during the past few days. Our arrangement, I mean.”

Her body language locked up a little more. “Arrangement?” she asked hesitantly.

“Our team. Maybe that’s a better word. I’ve summoned daedra before, much less intelligent than you, but I can’t compare the relationship. I also don’t know the nature of your relationship to the mortals you previously knew.”

“It wasn’t a relationship!” she replied swiftly.

He smiled beneath his mask and tried to shape his words to suit her. “Right, right, I didn’t mean that. You lived among mortals, but I don’t know the details of that part of your life. I don’t know if you can relate to me the way you related to whoever it was.” She started to become uncomfortable as he spoke, shifting her weight around and crossing and uncrossing her ankles. “I apologize, maybe this is delving too deep for a simple decision on when we’ll leave.”

“I guess,” she said with a nervous shrug. Her feigned casualness was easy to see through, but he joined her and tried to let her play it off. When he shook the broom toward the mess in the basement, she ignored it and looked at him pensively. “Tell me about the daedra you summoned,” she said. She didn’t budge from her spot on the crate, impressing him with her attempt to exorcise her anxiety on her own. Not only did she not wait for him to say something inspiring or motivating, but she also rebuffed his change of the subject.

Joining her on the crate, he turned to face the wall like she was. “You haven’t asked about my experience much,” he said warmly.

“I didn’t feel…it isn’t my place to pry.”

“Now you’re making me feel bad; I’m downright nosy compared to you, Tammy.”

“No. Why? If don’t want to talk about something, I tell you, and you always obey,” she replied, still amusing him with her concept of the word ‘obedience.’ “Most of the time, when you ask me…about…me…” She paused and fiddled with the hood connected to her mask nervously. “I like it,” she said, and then cleared her throat so obviously that he knew it was forced. “Anyway. Whatever. You’re not nosy. I don’t wish to be, either.”

“Never, you’re definitely not. And I’m flattered that you asked. So listen, we can do this: I’ll tell you what you want, and you don’t need to tell me anything this time. Not unless you feel like it. Teammates taking turns, yeah?”

This time when she folded her arms in front of her, she didn’t appear to be crawling into her shell. Though slightly anxious and perhaps not knowing where to put her hands, there was a faint form of comfort in the way she leaned back and looked down. He had a feeling that she was smiling again. “You won’t resent me if I just listen and don’t talk?” she asked.

“Didn’t you tell me just two days ago that I talk a lot?” he asked, immediately getting her to snort quickly into her mask. She really was smiling. “You’re asking me to do what I’m second best at, after reading.”

“Whatever you say,” she replied, almost pleasantly and far removed from the pouty, scowling demoness he’d met almost a week ago. The two of them fell comfortably silent, causing her to turn her head to him. “Well?”

“Right, right. My experience with summoning daedra?”

“Yes, Lloyd.”

“Well, like I said, none of them were intelligent. My knowledge of conjuration is limited - very limited. Nothing like my knowledge of restoration or destruction. I guess I tried conjuration rituals at a school on Stros M’kai for the first time.”

“I thought you’re from Daggerfall?” she asked.

“I am, and I studied magic there for the first time. I just didn’t practice conjuration until I was able to get away from my family.”

“Why would you want to get away from your family?!”

“Ha ha, that seemed to have struck a nerve with you.”

“What? Me? No. No, no, Lloyd. I’m saying…families are like clans. How can a person leave their clan?”

“Now you’re digging deeper,” he replied. When she bristled, he chuckled and waved his hands. “It’s okay, I swear I’m not bothered. I’ll answer both. My family is weird for my country. They’re one of the few Breton clans who don’t have an aptitude for magic. I excelled as a kid, and knew magic without studying like many people who become sorcerers. My family wanted me to join the military like my dad and uncles; I tried the city guard for two years, got tired of executing people and arresting vagrants, and quit. My family viewed my action as quitting them, so I took the chance to leave.”

“No, Lloyd, no. What you did was wrong. Wait, why are you laughing?”

“Because your reactions are cute,” he chortled.

The time when he called her cute, instead of pulling away shyly, she folded her arms and tilted her shoulders to him in a manner that was almost sassy. That just made him laugh even harder, and she found herself unable to feign anger. “I’m trying to have a serious conversation!”

“I’m sorry, I really am. Look, I’m not laughing, it’s passed. But why are you so insistent on supporting my family without even knowing them?”

She shook her head at him. “Clans are important, Lloyd. Loyalty to the clan is everything. The individual is…alone…without a clan,” she said, dead serious and wistful.

“If I hadn’t left my family, I would never have come here and met you. You wouldn’t have this mission right now.” Her breath hitched in her throat, and even Lloyd felt himself tense up. “I’m sorry, was that a low blow?”

Nervous again, her hands fidgeted as rhythmically as her moods. “No. It wasn’t. It’s true for both of us. That’s why you caught m off guard, and…let’s just leave it at that.”

“Yes, absolutely. I agree.”

“Just tell me about the daedra you summoned,” she said, coping surprisingly well with another nerve he’d ignorantly struck. He felt bad and proud at the same time.

“Right on. So at Stros M’kai, under teacher supervision, I summoned really basic things. Daedrats, Fiendroths, Banekin. I summoned a Scamp once and only once because they smell awful.”

Humming and looking to the ceiling, Tammaeroth breathed a bit easier. “That they do. Ugh.”

“I learned how to pull beings into Mundus, but I never summoned the same daedra twice. I never bonded with any.”

Without realizing it, Tammaeroth reacted under her breath. “Good,” she murmured into her mask.

“What was that?”

“Nothing. Continue your story, Lloyd.”

“Okay. Anyway, I wasn’t able to summon them on demand, on the spur of the moment. Not like a proper conjurer. I had to draw summoning circles, use runic chalk, candles, and the like. But it worked well because I could keep those daedra bound on Mundus indefinitely. I spent a lot of time observing them, just watching them, learning how the nature of the mortal plane affected them. Then I’d just send them back to Oblivion. I never really ordered them around except for the Banekin, mainly because they’re marginally more intelligent than the others and get bored.”

“Have you been to Oblivion?” she asked.

“Not yet. I’m one of the few mortals on Nirn who wants to, just to see it. And see what it’s like.”

“Do exactly as I say, and you will. Most likely for a short period of time, but you’ll see it.”

Footsteps reached their ears from the top of the stairs leading into the basement, ending their conversation early. Upon hearing the door to the basement open, Tammaeroth snatched the broom from Lloyd and wielded it so roughly that it really did look like a weapon. He moved forward and put an arm around her shoulder, breaking her concentration and saving the interloper from a terrible thrashing just as whoever it was came down the stairs.

It was Thorn, the local Altmer man who’d eaten breakfast with them yesterday. He had no idea that he could have been murdered with a broom had he descended the stairs just a few seconds earlier, and obliviously surveyed the illuminated mess of a basement. “Greetings, you two! We couldn’t find you anywhere. I kept searching the attic!”

Tammaeroth was still on edge and gripping the broom far too tightly. Lloyd squeezed her shoulder in an attempt to reassure her that she didn’t need to bludgeon any members of the house, and then spoke. “Oh, we were starting downstairs today, actually. Any news from upstairs?” he asked.

“News in the form of a question, hopefuls. Mead will debut his fondue fountain in a few days, and he needs to test out tonight. Do the two of you want in?”

The contrast between Tammaeroth’s total lack of a reaction and Lloyd’s excitement couldn’t have been starker. “Count us in! Are seats limited?”

Thorn seemed positively tickled by the response, and the man’s animated response made Tammaeroth appear even more stoic. “You guessed correctly, my dear Paradox! Please excuse my exit, for I need to answer him on your behalf before others reach him first. Dreamer, I’ll have a seat for you too!” the Altmer exclaimed cheerily, though he only elicited a grunt in response from the undercover Dremora.

With that, Thorn took his leave, and the pair was alone once again. Lloyd realized that his arm was still wrapped around Tammaeroth’s shoulder, and she actually wasn’t shrinking away or stiffening up. The position felt quite pleasant, even if she seemed thoroughly unimpressed by their meal plans.

“Sounds like we have pretty decent dinner plans once we finish down here,” he said, giving her shoulder a little shake.

Still gripping the broom, she shook her head again. He didn’t know what her expression was beneath the mask. “Food is just fuel,” she sighed.


	27. More Than Fuel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A certain daedra learns that there’s more to meals than feasting on the hearts of one’s fallen enemies.

From the morning until the evening, Lloyd and Tammaeroth cleaned the basement of the Manor of Masques, taking only a brief break around noon. Without pacing themselves, they’d gotten a lot of work done, but they’d also exhausted themselves well before nightfall. Both rewarding and taxing, the cleanup job had left the pair so tired that Lloyd had expended a bit of his slow-regenerating Magicka on spells to cure their fatigue as well as their sinuses and throats. With a sizable portion of the job done, the two of them slowly ascended the stairs to quench the thirst they’d both built up.

In the hallway, a sweet odor reached them both. To Lloyd, it was a welcome familiarity reminding him of less tumultuous times in Alinor. To Tammaeroth, it was a hidden treasure she hadn’t even been looking for. Tilting her head up in the air, she breathed deeply as they walked down the hall, not even noticing the clamor of a small group of people inside the kitchen.

“What is this?” Tammaeroth wondered out loud.

Lloyd lifted his mask up to get a better whiff of the substance. “Chocolate. Melted and delicious.”

“I’ve heard of chocolate,” she murmured, bewitched more and more with every step. “Why does it smell like this? Did the cook put drugs in it?”

“Oh no, trust me; it’s supposed to smell like this. Remember when I told you that I’d change your mind about food?”

She shook her head weakly. “Food is just fuel,” she said without an ounce of conviction in her voice.

Inside the kitchen, they found a familiar group of people standing around the countertop closest to the oven. Mead, Thorn, Lace, and a quiet member named Larksong were all huddled around a large bowl on a stand with a flat candle beneath it and a pile of strawberries next to it. Out from behind the group popped a familiar lanky, purple-clad figure whom they hadn’t seen in two days. Alchemy held her arms forward as if presenting the pair to the others.

“There you are, Paradox and Dreamer, Dreamer and Paradox! Won’t the two of you be joining us to help Mead with his taste test?”

Lloyd bowed to her as if he’d just put on a performance by showing up. “Long time no see; you must have one heck of a schedule right now,” he said as he and Tammaeroth lined up next to the others.

“Oh, I’ve been in and out, here and there. It seems that our schedules never quite match up, though.” Alchemy seemed to notice that Tammaeroth had become statuesque once around the group and stood next to the Dremora in disguise. “So, Dreamer, have you ever eaten chocolate before?”

For an awkward moment, Tammaeroth stared at the countertop, compelling her Altmer host to lean closer to her comically. Taken aback and unsure of how to react to another person moving within striking distance, Tammaeroth looked to Lloyd as if pleading to be saved from the conversation. As sympathetic as he felt, he also didn’t think that avoiding interaction was healthy, and he tried to guide her instead.

“You were just telling me about the time you’d bought chocolate from that snake oil salesman, right?” he joked. While talking, he reached behind her from an angle the others couldn’t see and gave her shirt sleeve a little tug. She still didn’t get it, and he had to give her a wink that he was sure Alchemy did notice so she’d catch on.

“I…well, I…bought chocolate from a snake oil salesman,” Tammaeroth stammered stiffly, not truly committing to the act.

Ever the mentor, Alchemy started to push her too. “That’s quite the story, Dreamer. I wonder, was this hawker of miracle cures claiming that chocolate could fill cavities? I’ve heard that one coming out of Cyrodiil lately.”

Tammaeroth didn’t get it at first. “Cyrodiil? My backstory isn’t…” Lloyd tugged at her shirt sleeve again, and she seemed to accept the fluidity of their fake identities. “Yes, it was miracle chocolate,” she said while seriously curbing her enthusiasm.

Ever perceptive, Alchemy let her off the proverbial hook after such a positive development in storytelling for a non-storyteller. “Well, you may have another culinary experience to write home about today. Mead works his own miracles here in the kitchen.”

The heavyset cook fiddled with a match near the flat candle beneath the pot. “At least, I hope so - so long as I can turn the heat on again,” the jolly cook replied in his heavy Eastmarch accent.

Tammaeroth’s eyes flicked down to the pot suspended over the candle and the broken match on the countertop. Disinterested and unassuming, she reached beneath the pot and snapped her fingers. The candle was alight with flame, heating up the chocolate inside the pot. The members of the house gathered around let out little cheers, startling the Dremora enough for her to ball up her fists. Lloyd noticed before the rest of them and clasped her hand.

“Thank you very much, Dreamer. That’s far easier than breaking all of my matches,” Mead chortled. Almost imperceptibly, Tammaeroth narrowed her eyes as if she thought he was being sarcastic.

Lace leaned forward to catch the attention of the Dremora in disguise. “That’s a new one. But can you juggle flames, that’s the question.”

Confused and suspicious, Tammaeroth froze up in front of everybody. Lloyd tried squeezing her hand, but the contact didn’t quite break her from her suspicious stupor, and she wasted a few more seconds judging the sincerity of the masked mortals around her. Alchemy recognized the anxiety right away and intervened again.

“That’s a question for practice in a few days. For now, I think we all have stomachs in need of filling.” Alchemy didn’t look directly at Mead, but he nodded while she spoke.

“Let’s get started, then. Here.” Mead took small dishes and served up strawberries for everyone in line, starting from Larksong. Loyd leaned a little closer to Tammaeroth while the others were preoccupied.

“Since when can you cast fire magic?” he whispered lower than anyone else could have heard.

Her fist flexed within his hand. He uncurled her fingers in his own, which she allowed, but she actually tugged on his hand roughly.

“Not now,” she whispered back urgently. He nodded and let the topic rest, though he wondered why she hadn’t used such magic when they were being chased through the sewers of Alinor nearly a week before.

Halfway through the short line, Mead served up a few strawberries to Alchemy. Ever the hostess, she passed hers on to Tammaeroth. “Shall I show you how it’s done?” the Altmer asked.

Tammaeroth picked up a strawberry by the leaf and held it out as if it were a poisoned apple. “That’s fine,” she replied suspiciously.

Alchemy took one of the strawberries and dipped it into the melted chocolate, twirling it around so the excess would drip off. Once the melted substance dried into a coating, she slipped her mask up just enough to take a modest bite. “Mmm, Mead, I think you found the right balance of everything.”

The Nord breathed easily upon the first complement. “You think so? I decided to make this sugar-free; I was concerned about how it would turn out.”

Thorn tried to speak, but he hadn’t finished chewing, much to everyone else’s entertainment. While they politely laughed and ate, Tammaeroth continued to stare at the strawberry. Lloyd took the last one from her bowl and dipped it in, waiting for it to drip dry before slipping his mask up and taking a bite, too. “Come on…we’re already here, right?” he whispered to her. “It’s okay to forget about the world outside for a while and just enjoy ourselves.”

Under polite peer pressure, Tammaeroth sighed and gave in. Dunking her strawberry twice, she pulled it up to find a large amount of chocolate sticking to it. Her impatience as she waiting for the excess to drip off was disproportionate, and she even rested her free hand on her hip as if she were disappointed in the inanimate substance for responding to gravity too slowly. Once she found that the chocolate had dried, she held it in front of her face and stared at it like a child might stare at a smelly vegetable dish. In the end, she slipped her mask down and bit into the very tip of the berry.

At first, she chewed slowly, much like an ewe bored with her existence. Her tongue poked around in her mouth as she rolled the pieces she’d chewed up and sucked the chocolate off. Confusion marked her expression for no readily available reason, and she paused after swallowing to test if she’d been poisoned or not. She took a second bite, this time nibbling at the end like a rabbit and chewing hard. Her eyes focused on the fondue bowl as she sped up the pace, finishing the pieces more quickly. Without hesitation, she ate the rest of the strawberry, leaves and all, chewing so rapidly that Lloyd winced in phantom pain at the thought that she might bite her own tongue at such a speed. Her eyes widened and she hummed deep in her throat.

Having finally received his own strawberries, Lloyd held the little dish up as he watched Tammaeroth’s entire worldview evolve. “So, what’s your verdict-“

“More,” she replied while stealing his dish from his hand and dipping two strawberries into the chocolate at one time.

Lace was positively tickled by how fast Tammaeroth’s whole demeanor changed, patting the pretend-Dunmer on the shoulder. “Mead, I think you have a new fan!” Lace chortled, though Tammaeroth didn’t even notice. The Nord clasped his hands together and watched the newcomer devour all of Lloyd’s strawberries.

“You know, I was worried after the bland taste last time,” Mead said, wiping his hands on his apron. “Sugar is such an easy excuse; I’ve been trying for a while to perfect this without it.”

Alchemy watched Tammaeroth eat with a measure of amusement. “Yes, it…Yes, it seems that you’ve found the right mix when it comes to this,” the house mentor said in between taking humble bites from an individual strawberry.

As all of them ate except for Mead (the cook) and Lloyd (whose food had been stolen), Tammaeroth finished eating everything in front of her, including stray leaves in the serving bowl as well as a literal twig at the bottom. Hungry but happy that she’d mingled with a group of other mortals without growling at them, Lloyd leaned close to Tammaeroth while watching everyone else get to eat.

“Is it just fuel?” he asked quietly.

Finished eating everything organic in her general vicinity, she pulled her mask back down and looked at him in a haze. She seemed like a poor mortal farmer at that point, like a person raised on nothing but bread and potatoes who’d eaten honey for the first time. Even through the haze, though, there was that rare look in her eye when she wasn’t paranoid and aware of every movement and noise around her. Indeed, her first taste of chocolate fondue had relegated her to a state of ease he wished he could see in her more often.

“Shut up,” Tammaeroth said flatly, her hand still on her hip.

The words were followed by a rush of air behind her mask, and he knew that she was smiling again. For the first time since he’d met her, she was trying to be funny; not only funny, but funny and at ease while mixed with strangers. He smiled too while the others gave the cook ideas for dessert.

“I told you,” Lloyd replied.


	28. Fantasy and Doubt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief moment of clarity reveals the motivation for procrastination.

For the first time, the two of them ate dinner at the normally scheduled time with the full members of the house. They didn’t go out of their way to meet anybody new, nor did they sit among the others, but they at least remained on time and got to eat more than other people’s leftovers. Seated in their spot on a bench against the back wall, they were able to view the kitchen when all fifteen or so of the house’s current residents happened to finish their various rehearsals and duties at the same time. Despite the crowding and the noise, Tammaeroth sat through their entire meal without tensing up at the various sounds caused by people of that number sharing a meal in one kitchen. She didn’t even complain when the time for washing the dishes approached, seemingly accepting the lower social status of their work as a part of their daily routine without complaining about the lack of prestige.

Lloyd was proud, as he told her, though she only hummed at the end of the night when they stood alone in the kitchen. He stood next to her and realized how tired he felt; they’d cleaned the basement, eaten a full meal, done the dishes for over fifteen people, and cleaned the whole kitchen long after they both felt like sleeping. Plus, she’d gorged on chocolate covered strawberries before dinner. He didn’t fault her for barely registering his complement as they blew the candles out and went to their little storage closet. The hallway felt like a long walk, and she actually took her belt off before they even entered the room.

“I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that much in one time,” she sighed with content as he opened the door. She walked past him and attended to their bedding.

“Sometimes it’s nice to slow down and enjoy frivolities, isn’t it?” he asked.

She actually did slow down and turn to look at him in the doorway. “That word…frivolity. I always understood it to be a bad thing. I wonder if I should feel guilty about this evening.”

“Oh, I don’t know…it’s not the kind of thing one should engage in daily, but every once in a while, a treat isn’t a bad thing.”

Humming and fiddling with the various fabrics and covers they slept on, she paused to look at him sideways. “You really expect me to do all of this myself?” she asked slyly, approaching what could be considered - by her stoic standards - another joke.

He shook his head. “I didn’t take a break for a few hours; I need to stop by the bathroom before bed,” he said while watching how slowly, almost lazily, she unfolded the blankets and comforters they used. “Don’t worry, I’m not dodging responsibilities.”

In her chocolate-induced haze, she continued to hear his words on only the most base level. “Yes, break. Sounds good,” she mumbled while taking off her mask, a drowsy smile still on her face.

Not wanting her to prepare the room all by herself, he took his leave swiftly and went across the hall to the bathroom. His hands were clean from the dish soap, but he’d been wearing the mask most of the day even when cleaning the dusty basement. Once he’d taken it off, he was able to breathe a little easier and wash his face. He might have expected that the days-long hike in the wilderness would have been more strenuous, but he actually found the days of housekeeping to be tougher. As he finished freshening up, he decided to always be extra nice to innkeepers in the future; he hadn’t realized how challenging the job of cleaning up after other people was until then.

A few minutes later, he peeked out into the hallway to be sure that the unlit corridor was empty. There wasn’t a peep to be heard, though that was due in part to the fact that their specific hallway in the back of the building was lined only by various categories of storage and utility rooms. Sneaking across the hall, he slinked into the bedroom and locked the door behind him slowly so as to avoid creating more noise than necessary.

Once inside, he cast the weakest of light spells to avoid stepping on anything. Perplexed by the darkness, he was surprised by what he saw: the entire room was made up and Tammaeroth was already asleep under the covers, not snoring but breathing heavily. The rhythm was as hypnotic as the slight movement of her lungs pumping air, especially when contrasted to how still she laid there. He felt tired just watching her. How she’d changed out of her clothes and made both of their sleeping spots so quickly, though, was a mystery he chalked up to her people’s military culture; every movement she made was direct, efficient, and purposeful.

Laying his own dusty clothes for the day on the couch, he slipped beneath his blanket next to her and sat up for a moment. He was fatigued, but his mind needed time to rest.

In the stillness of the night air, his mind floated in a breeze of both fantasy and doubt. Next to him, Tammaeroth slept more peacefully than he’d ever thought possible for a warlike creature such as her. Ravenesque hair spilled all over her offwhite pillow, adding to the sense of contrast that defined her. In all of his years studying the nature of Oblivion and its inhabitants, any accounts of Dremora friendly toward mortals were rare and bizarre exceptions to the general rule. How one of those exceptions had walked into his life, just at the right time, was a bizarre coincidence difficult of acceptance for a disbeliever in fate such as him. At the exact moment when he was about to be arrested, she intervened; he’d still lost everything he’d built in the Summerset Isles, but he wasn’t alone.

Therein crept the doubt. Soon enough, he’d be alone again. Not on speaking terms with his family in Daggerfall and scattered across the globe like his former classmates on Stross M’kai, his exclusion from the Mage’s Guild meant the burning of his last bridge in the world. Sure, Alchemy would shelter him, but he knew he couldn’t continue like that forever: living on the back of his friend, accepting her charity in return for a life as a janitor in a house where he’d already read every single book during his last stay in Rellenthil. Such a lifestyle was unbecoming of a capable and aspiring researcher.

So what came after Summerset? The question taunted him and his tired mind. He’d slip through Oblivion and back into Mundus - so fast, he expected, that he wouldn’t even have time to take publishable field notes and at least benefit professionally from the ordeal. The person sleeping next to him, the only person in the world who’d come to his aid and wasn’t permanently based in Summerset, didn’t know where she’d go in the end and wouldn’t even speculate. Tammaeroth’s uncertain future, in particular, stung him as he sat awake in bed. She’d come into his life at a dangerous moment yet would only remain a part of it long enough for him to venture into unknown territory penniless and homeless. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d been in such an unenviable state, but it would be the first time he’d say goodbye to someone when he’d rather not do so.

Rubbing his eyes, he slid down beneath the covers and rested his head on his pillow, which she’d laid directly next to hers. Deep and negative thoughts could wait for later. At that moment, all he wanted to do was sleep and forget about the world outside of the Manor of Masques, and just delay Tammaeroth’s urge to leave for Shimmerene for as long as he could.


	29. Everything in Moderation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was only a matter of time.

The next morning, to the surprise of both Lloyd and Tammaeroth, they actually didn’t wake up in a compromising position. Perhaps it was because they were both in such deep sleeps from the day before, for when they awoke, they were both simply sleeping like sprawled out rocks. Their ankles were intertwined, and his arm was under her pillow and thus her head, but that was more innocent and less embarrassing than how they’d woken up on previous mornings.

Slowly and comfortably, they woke up and carried on with their daily routine: cleaning the basement together in two shifts, inspecting the attic and other parts of the house to plan the rest of their work in between, and lingering in the kitchen to clean up after everybody else had finished eating. During their breaks, Lloyd sat in the house study and read every gazette and periodical he could get his hands on. Tammaeroth read for as long as she could tolerate the activity, at which point she wandered off to inspect the house. She actually displayed more comfort in leaving him alone and unmonitored than when they’d arrived, even wandering downstairs once. By the time the evening had come, they realized that another day had passed without the two of them planning their departure or discussing anything deeper than the gryphon feathers they planned on selling.

On that specific evening, a number of house members returned late due to a rehearsal for an upcoming show. Dinner was a laborious, drawn out affair as members walked in alone or in pairs, ate slowly, and left before the next member entered. Prepared for a long night, Lloyd excused himself and walked to the house’s back anteroom, facing outward toward the theatre in the distance. The door hung open, and a few members he didn’t recognize stood at the exit with glasses in their hands. A few bottles sat on a small coffee table in the little room, and one of the full members - a weary local who smelled of embers - noticed Lloyd’s entrance.

“Yes, Hopeful, it’s brandy. And it’s a gift to the house!”

Weary himself, Lloyd flexed his fingers - sore from dishwashing and floorsweeping - and approached the trio near the open door. “I haven’t had a drink in a few years,” he said as he joined them.

A less fragrant local playfully forced an empty glass into his hand. “That’s an interesting take on moderation, friend,” she said when he accepted the glass. “Or shall we call this a drink for old time’s sake?”

Lloyd didn’t understand her joke, but he let her pour a tiny bit of wine in the glass anyway. “We can call it that, sure. To whom do I owe the honor, by the way?”

“You owe it to Allegro,” she said proudly. “Firebird brought the wine, though.”

The man who smelled like burnt wood nodded. “It was also brought to me, though. A visiting official from Auridon gifted it when stopping through.”

The third member there by the door, who hadn’t introduced herself, slipped her mask back down after taking a sip of her wine. “So, hopeful, what is it that moves your heart to create?” she asked.

Once he’d finishing sipping his own drink, Lloyd tried to churn out a decent story; none of the members had asked him so far, having assumed that he and Tammaeroth were mere janitors. “That’s what I’ve been seeking,” he replied, clearing his throat to stall for a few more seconds. “I’ve tried to take this as an opportunity to practice interior decorating, seeing as how much the house needs it.”

“Well, that’s the spirit! Most of us discover passions we hadn’t expected when we enter here,” Allegro said. The four of them fell quiet a they drank until footsteps pattered into the anteroom. “And here is your partner in this endeavor, yes?”

Lloyd turned to see Tammaeroth approaching them, though she stopped a few paces short of actually joining them. Though she’d become less standoffish with people who spoke to him, there was still a measure of alertness in her eyes as she hovered behind him like a bodyguard (which was, essentially, her actual role). Content to just stand there and monitor the conversation, she didn’t realize and possible didn’t care that her behavior may be viewed as odd, and Lloyd waved for her to come closer.

“This is Dreamer, seeking the same path as I do, for now,” he said when Tammaeroth joined them. He innocently offered her a glass which Allegro handed him, giving the act little thought. “I was just telling them about our plans to become interior designers,” he told her. She didn’t understand his wink, and she stared at their glasses for a few seconds.

“Are you drinking blood?” she asked with surprise, amusing Allegro.

“The blood of grapes, if you want to call it that, Dreamer!” The high elf laughed at her own joke until she noticed the confusion on the face of what she thought was a dark elf. “It’s brandy, actually. Have you ever tried it?”

“I’ve never tasted alcohol,” Tammaeroth replied, surprising even Lloyd.

Firebird stood up straight, removing his back from the door frame. “Then let this be a night for new experiences…in moderation, of course.” The man picked up the nearest bottle and gave it a little shake/ “This bottle is finished; there’s some on the coffee table just behind you!”

Turning to see the two bottles, Tammaeroth walked away without so much as a word, brief and blunt as usual. The trio didn’t seem to mind, though, and Lloyd smiled as he watched the undercover daedra gradually adapting to living among mortals again. The voice of the unintroduced member pulled him away.

“So have you taken a look at our bunks, yet? I have a few ideas, but never the time to straighten anything up. Our rooms are dreadfully plain, if that makes any sense.”

“Oh, it does; it’s a sad state for any space to be underused in such a way,” Lloyd replied, making up everything on the fly. “Perhaps Dreamer and I can take a look tomorrow afternoon. We’d love the opportunity to try our hands at décor for living quarters.”

Allegro pushed his shoulder until his whole body turned, nearly derailing the conversation. “I don’t think your partner understands what she’s doing,” the Altmer said urgently.

Near the door leading back to the kitchen, Tammaeroth had a wine bottle tipped up toward the ceiling. Bubbles floated up to the top as she chugged, drinking up an obscene volume of a bottle of wine in a matter of seconds. She didn’t let up, just like when she was stealing Lloyd’s food and water, and he and Allegro moved toward her.

“Dreamer, wait, wait, wait,” he said while trying to grab her arm. She pulled it away from him at first, but she let him pull the tip of the bottle from her lips the second time. “That’s too much.”

She licked her lips and pulled her mask back down. “That guy said I could drink it,” she said as a matter of fact. She then hiccuped loudly, giving Lloyd the chance to wrest the bottle out of her grip. “This stuff tastes good.”

“My good lady, we must show some restraint,” Firebird chortled, so casually that he didn’t seem to take the matter that seriously. Allegro, however, accepted the bottle from Lloyd and tried to hide it under the coffee table.

“No big deal; there’s a first time for everything,” Allegro said, “but be careful with how much you drink at once. The beauty of brandy is found only when you savor the taste. Drop by drop, you see?” She pulled her mask up slightly and took a little sip from her glass to demonstrate, but the instructions were lost on Tammaeroth, who seemed to know nothing of temperance in food and drink.

Picking her own glass back up, the Dremora in disguise held it next to Lloyd’s and looked at him expectantly. “I guess so,” she replied, waiting for him to understand that she wanted more. He poured only the tiniest bit of his drink into her glass and watched as she slurped it up in one gulp.

Patient like a schoolteacher, Allegro tried again. “Here, more like this.” She took an even smaller sip this time, and Tammaeroth held her glass to Lloyd’s again. He gave her a similarly small portion of his wine into her glass, thus forcing her to take in a little at a time. “There, more like that,” Allegro said.

Before Tammaeroth could demand more, footsteps approached from outside. Two members whom Lloyd didn’t recognize walked in, greeted everybody, and passed straight into the kitchen. Tammaeroth strangely didn’t react like intruders were invading the house, a pleasant contrast to her previous reactions to the sound of doors opening. After the two members were gone, another one exited from the kitchen and slowed down as she walked in between everybody.

“Look at this happy bunch milling about here,” the woman wearing half a mask said as she passed. Lloyd recognized her as Clever, whom he’d met the last time he’d been in Rellenthil, and he bowed his head in hopes that she wouldn’t recognize him.

“Just trying to unwind after an exceptionally taxing day,” Firebird replied.

Clever as her name implied, Clever pretended to stretch her back and took the nearly depleted bottle of brandy from beneath the coffee table. “I know how that feels,” she said, spinning around strategically like she thought nobody had noticed what she held behind her back.

The heretofore unnamed house member continued standing by the doorway but tried to block Clever. “Which is why we’re all trying to relax after dinner,” the unintroduced artist said. She reached to the other side of the door frame acting like she needed to rest, and Clever was unable to leave.

Instead, the sneaky high elf spun back around and tried to return to the kitchen. “Anyways, I don’t want to prevent anyone from their day’s rest. You can find me in the room.”

Making a sort of game out of it, Allegro stepped in her way to block the kitchen door. “And which room might that be?” she asked curiously.

“You know, the room we all stay in,” Clever replied. Larksong, who’d also been outside, passed through the anteroom toward the kitchen. Allegro moved out of her way, strategically stepping back again before Clever could slip by. “Well, I guess I’d better get going,” she laughed, unable to maintain a straight face. 

“Not quite yet,” Allegro said while winking at Lloyd, who was standing behind Clever. Reluctantly, he took the bottle from the sword-swallower’s hand.

“Oh, drat, you’re no fun,” Clever replied when she was finally allowed to pass into the kitchen. Allegro followed her in, leaving Lloyd with Firebird and the unnamed artist by the door.

“That Clever sure is…Clever,” Firebird chortled. When the conversation turned silent, he looked at Lloyd. “Hey, where did Dreamer go?”

Faintly in the distance, a shriek from the outside reached the doorway, giving all three of them pause. Lloyd nearly choked when he noticed that the third, unopened bottle of wine was missing, replaced by Tammaeroth’s empty glass.

“There’s a demon in the garden!” shrieked Lace from somewhere outside.


	30. Lightweight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A major crisis is averte in favor of a minor crisis instead.

Setting his glass down, Lloyd brusquely exited the back door, leaving the two house members behind him. Firebird tried to follow him, but in his minor panic, Lloyd waved the other man away.

“No need to worry; I think that Dreamer is practicing her illusion spells again,” he nervously laughed.

Although he didn’t follow, the Altmer seemed to realize that things were amiss. “Alright then. Take care now, yes?” Firebird said with concern.

Lloyd waved and walked into the darkness behind the Manor of Masques; the theatre hung over the horizon, but the closet path behind the house was unlit, unlike the main road closer to the theatre. He stopped to listen for the sound of Lace’s voice again, forcibly ignoring the hundred scenarios swirling around in his head. To his right, he saw movement in a hedge-surrounded garden on the side of the building and cast his light spell.

Upon seeing the light, Lace hurried over to him shaking. She kept ducking low even though there wasn’t anything to hide behind. “I heard it! Oh Paradox, I heard a demon growling between the hedges over there!”

He put his arm around her and lead her in the direction of the back door, looking all around while they spoke. “I’m sure there’s a logical explanation for it,” he said, fighting to remove any nervousness from his voice.

“No, I heard it! There’s a demon whispering over there, I swear I heard it!”

“I’m sorry to hear that you were scared like this. I’ll go take a look now, but I’m sure it’s just a prank, or…” An idea popped into his head just as they rounded a corner and walked into view of Firebird at the back doorway. It was risky, but if she believed him, then it could preemptively answer a few difficult questions. “You know, a few of us had a bit to drink tonight. A handful of them, you know, some I don’t know plus Dreamer plus a few I recognized, they were messing around with a noise spell. A little immature if you ask me.”

Lace hugged herself as the two of them met Firebird at the doorway. “Really? But I…I only heard one voice. There was movement, and eyes, and, it was so scary. Maybe we should tell the others.”

“Oh no, I’m sure it’s just a bit of horsing around,” Lloyd said one the two of them joined Firebird at the doorway. The Altmer projected a subtle concern in his eyes, especially when he continued looking at Lloyd instead of Lace.

“I’ll see Lace inside to some green tea,” Firebird said cautiously, “but let us know when you get to the bottom of this, yes?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll probably be back to tell you in the next few minutes or so. I’ll sort them out if they were doing this on purpose.” Lloyd tried to look serious as he spoke, but his failure became apparent when Lace ignored him and Firebird took all traces of the drinks with them into the kitchen.

“Why would people do that? I just wanted to go for a walk by myself,” Lace whined as the two entered the kitchen.

Lloyd waited for a few moments and, once he was sure they were gone, sprinted into the darkness of the garden with only the faintest hint of his light spell hovering over the ground. His heart thumped uncomfortably fast in his chest as he scanned the area, hoping that none of the other house members heard what Lace had. Footsteps lead him further along the side of the building and into the dense garden tucked behind the house’s woodworking shop. All was silent; he was thankful that there weren’t any more witnesses, but worried when he couldn’t hear Tammaeroth.

After a few more steps, his heart skipped a beat: there was a hopeful’s mask among the flowers. He picked it up and dusted it off, immediately sensing the enchantment on it. For sure, it was the voice manipulation which Alchemy had given to Tammaeroth, worrying him even further. She was nowhere to be found, and he tried to ignore the state of panic settling in: eventually, people in the kitchen would start asking where the two of them were. If they asked Firebird or Lace, the story could spread, compromising their disguises. He began walking in circles around the garden, calling out her name every few paces.

He didn’t know how much time passed before he heard the mumbling in the bushes. Faint enough to sound involuntary, the sound didn’t repeat itself until he called her name again.

“Tammy? Where are you?”

“Hmm…where am I…” she replied cryptically enough that he understood why Lace had been scared.

He followed the sound to a hedge wall, finding footsteps near a number of upturned branches low to the ground. “Tammy? Are you in there?” he asked, hands shaking anxiously until she answered.

“Lloyd…I think I made a mistake,” she mumbled in a suppressed voice implying an odd neck posture.

Kneeling down, he intensified his light spell and fund a heap of a person hiding beneath the bushes. Sighing his relief out loud, he began to pull her out of the bushes immediately. She didn’t resist, and he wondered why she’d been sitting there when she was able to crawl out on her own. When he helped her stand, she wobbled a little but remained upright. “Are you okay? That’s what’s most important.”

She turned away from him and stared into the bushes. “I shouldn’t have done that,” she muttered quietly, refusing to look at him. “I feel sick.”

“You probably are sick. Drinking that much that quickly would make anyone sick, especially since you said you’ve never tasted alcohol before.” He put his arm around her shoulder and tried to turn her to face him. “It was an honest mistake, it’s okay. Here, I have your mask.”

Further disturbing him with her actions, she grabbed his arms when he tried to help her don her mask again. “No, I can’t,” she slurred.

“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” he asked while letting her push his hands away. He tried to pull her to him again, only for her to turn away from him again. “Tammy, I’m worried about you. Are you-“

Bending over violently, she dry heaved over the grass, gripping her knees and shaking unstable. On instinct, he held on to her and prevented her from falling over when she retched for the second time. She finally threw up a little bit into the grass, and he held her hair away from her face. Gasping for air, she shook and held on to him when she was done.

“Why did it taste so good if it makes people sick,” she groaned over the grass. “I never want to drink this stuff again.”

He rubbed her back until she seemed more stable and then helped her to stand again. “The irony of food and drink is that the most flavorful is usually unhealthy. Come here, let me get a look at you…are you hurt?” She didn’t answer and continued turning away from him. “Tammy, please. I’m trying to help.”

Reluctantly, she let him turn her to face him. Though her eyes were usually the color of black silk, there was redness in the small bit of sclera visible around the edges. A bit of rheum had collected in the corners, which wasn’t like her; even in the mornings after she woke up, he’d never noticed any, to the point where he’d assumed that Dremora biology didn’t include that. Which might have been true with the exception of inebriation.

“It hasn’t even been half an hour since your first drink…I didn’t think it was possible for anyone to be drunk that fast. Medically speaking, I mean.”

She shook her head, swaying a little too much on each side and holding on to the fabric of his shirt to avoid falling down. “I’m not drunk, I was just sick.”

The two of them stood there in the garden in what would otherwise have been a pleasant moment. Instead, he continued thinking of Lace’s reaction and the possibility of questions or even rumors being passed around. He had to tell her.

“Listen, Tammy…Lace heard you talking to yourself in the bushes. She thought it was a stranger and got scared. I told them a story so they wouldn’t ask more questions, but I’ll need you to back me up exactly.”

Her fingers held on to his shirt a little more tightly, but not as tightly as usual when her paranoia was stoked. “I wasn’t wearing my mask…Lloyd, does she know what I really am?” Tammaeroth asked urgently.

“No, I convinced her that you and a few other members I didn’t recognized were playing a prank.”

“Lloyd, we have to leave now! This was a mistake!”

“Calm down, it was just a little misunderstanding. We need to go back in there and fix this, and everything will be fine.”

“No, we never should have come here,” she sighed.

“What? That doesn’t make…Tammy, they’ve given us food and shelter when we were living on nuts and berries. This is a great situation for us, and like we said, it’s better to wait for the justiciars to forget about us.”

“Lloyd, if they compromise my mission, I’ll-“ She hiccuped, preventing her from voicing her drunken wrath.

“It’s okay, I swear, it will all be okay, but I need you to support me here. Can you do that? Can you help me fix this?”

Maybe it was their dire need for stability and shelter, or maybe it was just the wine, but Tammaeroth didn’t argue. Rather than go through her usual gamut of refusals without explanation, she just blinked her increasingly bloodshot eyes and nodded her dazed head. “I can help,” she slurred.

“Good, I’m glad to hear that; we can only make it through all this together. So now, I need you to come with me to the house. We’re going to find Lace so you can explain that you’ve never had alcohol before and you were trying to be funny with your illusion magic. And you don’t know the members you were hanging out with.”

“How do I say all that?” she asked. She seemed overwhelmed by the short message, and he began to worry that he was asking too much of her.

“Alright, I’ll explain the details. I just need you to come to Lace, explain that you’ve never had alcohol before, and mention that you were joking with some people you don’t remember. That’s it; just say those exact words, and then I’ll help you rest. I’ll handle all the dishes tonight, save your energy.”

There was a hazy, almost distant look in her eye. That lack of clarity made her uncharacteristically pliant, though, and this was one case in which he felt zero guilt for exploiting that. “Rest is good,” was all she managed to intelligently say, and he smiled and nodded.

“It is, and I’ll do everything I can to help you get plenty of it tonight. You deserve it.” After he started to lead her back to the house, he realized that her face was still exposed. “Here, if your stomach feels better, then you should wear this again.”

Shocking him again with her lack of recalcitrance, she bowed her head like she expected him to put the mask on for her. He obliged, adjusting the garment while leading her back to the house’s back door. “I don’t feel like throwing up anymore,” she sighed in her altered, mortal-sounding voice, “but I still feel awful. Don’t let me do this again.”

He sighed too while they walked. “Don’t worry. We’re going to fix this.”


	31. First Time Drunk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fragility of their situation leads to overreaction, perhaps even paranoia, in them both.
> 
> This is also a short chapter again. I’m testing out the same form the story started with...hopefully the results will be entertaining and engaging.

By the time Lloyd had led Tammaeroth back into the Manor of Masques, the astoundingly rapid effects of the alcohol on her system had evened out. Though she’d gotten drunk faster than anybody he’d ever met, she reached a certain level whereby her motor skills and cogency didn’t seem to degenerate any further. Of course, they’d degenerated enough such that he still felt anxious when they entered the house to find Allegro waiting for them.

“There you are! Did you get to the bottom of the monster mystery?” Allegro asked as the two of them walked in. Tammaeroth stubbed her toe on the door frame and cursed, though Allegro thankfully wasn’t fazed. “Careful there. You weren’t exaggerating when you said you’ve never drunk before, were you, Dreamer?”

Too dazed to intelligently respond, Tammaeroth merely grunted and threw her arm over Lloyd’s shoulder for stability; her head remained level, but he could feel how uncoordinated her footsteps had become. “She didn’t seem to have a good first impression of it, I have to say,” he said on her behalf, forcing a smile in the hopes that it would help his voice sound relaxed. It didn’t, but they were both lucky that Allegro was unassuming and largely lacking in pretense, and the act proved unnecessary.

“Everybody has their own limits. At least you discovered yours in the company of friends, right?” Allegro nudged Tammaeroth’s shoulder, an action which could have gotten the Altmer physically hurt at any other time. That night proved fortunate in several ways, however, as the Dremora’s dizziness prevented her from fully registering the otherwise offensive contact from a stranger.

“Okay,” Tammaeroth replied, somewhat incoherently.

“Is Lace around?” Lloyd asked. “Dreamer just wanted to make sure that she’s not too spooked.”

Allegro waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, Lace is fine, and she was probably fine from the beginning.” Allegro leaned closer to them both, failing to notice when Tammaeroth straightened up defensively. “Between you and I, she’s a bit of a pity whore. A bit of middle sibling syndrome, you know what I mean?”

Uncomfortable with gossip in general but glad that at least one house member didn’t think the incident was a big deal, Lloyd breathed easy and stopped by the back hallway of the house. “Well, if she’s alright, then maybe she and Dreamer can speak tomorrow morning. You said you needed to lay down, right?” He hugged Tammaeroth a little closer to him to wake her up, garnering a little squeak from her nose.

“I need to rest my eyes,” Tammaeroth murmured.

“That’s probably for the best. It looks like you’ll be on your own for night duty, Paradox!” Allegro said near the hall to the rest of the house.

Not wanting to drag out the incident with Lace or risk showing how nervous he was, Lloyd nodded and turned the other way. “It is what it is; I’m happy to keep things clean for everyone. Listen, I need to help her settle in. I’ll see you around?” he asked Allegro.

“Most definitely. Who knows what sort of foibles we’ll have tomorrow night?” the high elf replied just as she took her leave.

Once she was gone, Lloyd helped Tammaeroth down the hall and into their room as swiftly as he could when she was almost walking into walls. Once inside the room, he lowered her onto the couch so she could take her mask off and regain her sense of balance while he prepared their bedding. Neither of them were tired yet, but for both of their sakes, he hoped that he could persuade her to spend the rest of the night away from the others; he had no idea how her behavior might be affected as the wine continued to run through her system.

While he laid out their bedding, she leaned forward and let her head hang low. She looked rather dejected in such a position, and as his sense of anxiety and fears of exposure passed, he began to feel bad for her situation.

“The walls are bendy, Lloyd,” she slurred. “Don’t give me this stuff again…I feel like…I feel like I don’t have a brain. Like it’s gone.”

“Don’t worry, this is a hard learning experience. I won’t drink either, we can just excuse ourselves.” He knelt in front of her once her sleeping spot was ready. “Listen, I’m going to help you lay down in what we call a recovery position. It will be safer in case you feel sick again.”

She tried to stand up, but ended up leaning way forward instead. “I’m already sick,” she murmured, her voice barely audible. She let him pull her down onto her bedding, only kicking her shoes off on her own. She was shockingly passive when he set her knees and shoulders to help her recover; her lack of activity worried him, especially when she then laid down and stared at the wall with her eyes glazed over. “I don’t think I can help you in the kitchen tonight.”

“I wouldn’t want you to, not in your current condition. Save your energy and try to sleep this off. That’s the most important thing right now.”

Keeping her chin tilted up, she held still but let her eyes closed. “I don’t like…I can’t let myself…be a burden. I’m supposed to be more…disciplined than this.”

“Tammy, stop. You didn’t know your body would react so strongly to the drink. This wasn’t your fault.”

“My behavior was dishonorable.”

“Come on, none of that now. Don’t put yourself down because of this. It’s a negative experience that we can learn from, that’s all.” Pausing for a moment, he held her wrist to check her pulse, which was only a tad bit slower than usual. “Trust me, people do much worse things than hiding in the bushes and mumbling when they’re drunk. Your first time was rather benign.”

She hummed in response, but otherwise didn’t react. He sat next to her for a few minutes, watching her slowed but steady breathing. Despite her stillness, she didn’t look peaceful as she laid there. Her pout remained on her face, and her body occasionally curled as if she had a stomachache. Since her condition wasn’t a disease, though, his curative magic couldn’t do a thing for her; the notion that she’d have to wait out the effects dampened his mood, and he spent a few more minutes just watching her. “You’re going to be okay…I know it must be bad, but it will pass.” When she didn’t answer, he checked her pulse one last time before standing up. She seemed to have fallen asleep already, and he breathed a little easier knowing that she was unlikely to wander away from him again.

He stifled a laugh at himself. So far, she’d been the one obsessively hovering over him at every moment; there he was returning the favor over what he hoped would be a minor incident they’d both overreacted to.

Once he’d traced a rune to lock the door behind him, he took his leave. He’d have a long evening cleaning up by himself.


	32. Sleep Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being forced together by circumstance can force the sharing of experiences, not all of them praiseworthy.

After a long night of kitchen cleaning and listening to Lace vent, Lloyd took what felt like an arduous walk down the back hall toward the storage closet turned bedroom. His hands felt oddly dry from all the dish soap and he was critically underslept, but he’d at least calmed down by the time the house had fallen silent. Lace easily bought the story about ‘Dreamer’ and a few house members drunkenly horsing around in the garden, and nobody else mentioned the incident all night. Any fears of their cover being blown had been dispelled, just like the lock spell on the bedroom door once Lloyd dispelled it.

The first thing he noticed when he entered the room was the very slight odor of bile. He quickly knelt down next to Tammaeroth and checked her position and breathing. She seemed fine, though she’d pulled a bucket over next to her and had apparently thrown up a little more into it; otherwise, she’d barely even moved since he’d left her. Wondering whether all Dremora reacted so negatively to alcohol or just her, he took the bucket to the bathroom across the hall and washed it out before returning for the night. Locking up, hanging his clothes on the couch, and carefully sliding onto his part of the bedding only took a few minutes.

With his light spell dimmed, he sat up for a while and tried to excise the stressful thoughts from his mind before laying down. Scenarios of the house members realizing that his companion was a daedra or of someone merely complaining to Alchemy (or worse, the Grand Maestro Forte) about the presence of two masked janitors in a storage closet taunted him and refused to lay to rest as he wanted to do. He had no idea how much fallout had actually occurred from the street fight in Alinor’s sewers and poor district, and thus he had no idea how safe it would be to leave the House of Reveries at any given time. Alchemy was too busy with her work to check local gossip for him, and he was too nervous to venture outside himself and ask around at local establishments for any news of a security incident in the capital. Blind and hidden, the storage closet he was sitting in, and the dysfunctional daedra laying next to him, was all he had. The stress he felt continued mounting even after Alchemy had provided him a safe space-

“Stupid.”

All of Lloyd’s negative thoughts stopped rather quickly upon hearing the voice next to him. He knew it was Tammaeroth, of course, but the suddenness of her words shocked him out of his pessimistic wallowing. He turned to see her in the same position, unmoved and in a deep sleep aside from the occasional twitching from intestinal pain.

“Worthless…traitor,” Tammaeroth mumbled in her sleep.

The pout on her face turned into a deep frown, almost pained in its sadness. He’d seen her in bad moods before, especially when she began to approach any topics bordering on the personal, but the way she looked as her words involuntarily tumbled from her mouth was so pitiful that he felt her sadness to be like a contagious disease.

“Dishonor,” she mumbled again.

Lloyd was conflicted. He was curious about whatever nightmare she was having, but didn’t want to invade her privacy. He was upset by the bad dream she seemed to be having, but didn’t want to wake her up and interrupt her sleep. He was stressed by his own inability to do anything for her, but didn’t want to infantilize her as if she couldn’t cope with her own inner demons.

“So stupid…I made a mistake,” she murmured, followed by a groan from deep down in the pit of her stomach.

If he did nothing, he likely wouldn’t sleep. If he did something, he had mixed chances of helping her. In the end, he scooted closer to her and laid a hand on her shoulder. Her skin was a bit colder to the touch than usual, and her reaction to the contact was immediate. The tension in her abdomen reduced, and most of her movement stopped. Her head rotated a quarter before falling back down onto the pillow again. For a good five minutes, she became statuesque, and he hoped that her discomfort had dissipated.

His Hope was premature, however, as he found when he removed his hand. A moment later, before he tried to lay down, she shifted positions again.

“Loser…traitor…get out,” she murmured.

Caught between being sleepy and unable to sleep, he decided to take the riskier route to comfort her. Feeling her forehead temperature with the palm of his hand, he ruled out the possibility of cold chills. He brushed back the stray strands of her jet black hair, more fully revealing the painful expression on her face.

“Tammy…are you sleeping?” he whispered while leaning down to her.

Though she didn’t move or outwardly react, she did continue sleep talking. “Failure,” she whispered into her pillow. “Leave…traitor…you mistake.”

Doubt about his own actions crept into the back of his mind. Even though none of what she’d said made sense, a part of him felt like it was wrong to continue. In her state, in the setting of a private room alone, to listen to anything she might say felt like an intrusion. He couldn’t shake the sense that he was witnessing a trauma which wasn’t meant for anyone else, mortal or demon, to see or hear. Yet there they were, paired together by circumstance, essentially stuck in a single room which he couldn’t exactly leave. Rather than helping him to feel less guilty due to compulsion, the knowledge of their situation just made him feel helpless.

“Just get out.”

In his feebleness, he rested on one elbow so he could speak to her more clearly, rather than ignoring her words and erasing them from his mind. “Who should get out?” he whispered to her.

Despite seeming to be either asleep or delirious with her eyes closed, she responded directly. “Tammaeroth,” Tammaeroth said. “Expel the traitor.”

“You…” He paused, both to reconsider his phrasing as well as to see if she’d been woken up when he responded. She didn’t. “Tammaeroth is honorable,” he said, attempting to change her tone. It didn’t work that well.

“No. False. Lies. Like her.” She curled into her pillow a little more and kicked her blanket off, revealing that she hadn’t even taken off her pants before falling asleep. Another twitch of her abdomen signaled lingering effects of her body’s adverse reaction. “Killed clan.”

He didn’t know if she’d relax or not; waiting didn’t seem to stop her sleep talk, and the look on her face hurt him so much that he couldn’t sleep and couldn’t look away. “Daedra rebirth,” he whispered, trying to allay her nightmares without prying into them. His efforts still failed.

“Not all. Not in the aether. She killed them.”

Still leaning on his elbow just behind her, he tried to lay a hand on her shoulder again. Some of the creases in her frown melted away, and she became still. “Traitor. Killer,” she murmured anyway.

He was already committed. Her nightmare was unavoidable for them both. “Killed who?” he asked.

Her face bored into the pillow like she could dig her way to an escape. “The clan,” she whispered. “Betrayed. Killed vestige. Gone forever. Worthless.”

Without truly thinking, he laid all the way down behind her and wrapped his arm around her waist. The closeness would normally have made even him nervous, much less her, but the delicate nature of the moment may have been what caused him to ignore such a sensation.

Her back arched at first and then curved, and she unconsciously pressed her back into his chest. The feeling of so much of her skin against his gave him goosebumps at first, but his exhaustion nearly made him ignore the feeling altogether. The tension in her muscles disappeared, and her posture melded into his.

“Not worthless. Start again. Rebirth. Atone,” he whispered into her ear.

He didn’t even know what he was saying, or if the implication would be clear to her, but this time, she stayed quiet. Her breathing evened out, and settled in against him as the two of them laid there. The lean muscle of her back loosened against his chest and stomach, and her head laid heavy into her pillow. For a while, he waited to see if she’d talk again, but she only laid there, seemingly escaping from her nightmare. His eyes closed like hers, and his dim light spell fizzled out into the night.


	33. Awake Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A curious moment of clarity on the morning of a first hangover.

The morning came slowly for them, as it tended to in the house, with most of the members finishing breakfast before Lloyd and Tammaeroth were woken up. Drowsy and sore, he blinked a few times and slowly remembered which day it was. His movements began to wake Tammaeroth up, and her squirming and groaning woke him up even more quickly. Her fingers intertwined with his and clung to his hand tightly enough such that he couldn’t remove his arm from her waist. Her back curved and pressed into him, and he immediately realized that she’d somehow kicked her pants down to her ankles while asleep. In fact, he was probably more aware of that than anything else, especially when he felt the fabric of her underwear pushing into his lap.

As much as he would have liked to just lay there spooning her for a few more minutes…hours…maybe more, they still had to show up to breakfast and make sure that nothing seemed amiss to the other house members. Carefully, he turned his head toward the ceiling so she could hear him.

“Tammy…”

Eyes closed, she groaned again and frowned into her pillow. “Head hurts,” she murmured. He could tell that she was awake, and probably as aware of their position as he was, but the hangover she must have woken up with kept her right there on their bedding.

“I’m sorry; that happens. Another reason not to drink.” She hummed at him without opening her eyes or shifting positions, and he cursed his luck for having to leave at that moment. “Listen…you can rest up here for a bit, but I need to show my face. I mean, mask.”

Gulping on a bitter taste in her mouth, she frowned and tried to bury her head even deeper into the pillow. “I’m coming,” she mumbled noncommittally.

Savoring the last moments there, he held on to her and listened to the clinking of plates and cutlery from down the hall. Quite innocently, he tried to broach her nightmares however many hours before.

“Tammy…you were talking in your sleep last night,” he said softly, but he received her fingernails digging into his hand in reaction. “Ouch!”

Her whole body twisted, though with less vigor due to her headache, and she practically rolled onto him trying to figure out which way was up. Hair a mess and pants wrapped around her feet, she looked at him with eyes nearly glazed over while struggling to keep her head up. She pulled her hand away to lay it on the floor and stabilize herself, noting how hard she’d clamped down onto his hand.

“Sorry,” she said while letting go of his hand, red nail marks and all.

“It’s alright, I’m sure you must feel…off-center after your experience last night.”

Staring at him intently, she looked wide awake, if dizzy, and as anxious as he’d seen her during their first few nights together. “What did I say?” she asked with a hint of nervousness in her voice. He froze, worried about embarrassing her. “Lloyd, did I say actual words?”

For once, she didn’t avoid eye contact, and he felt pinned. “You had a nightmare. I didn’t want to intrude on your privacy, but you really seemed…upset. I wasn’t sure if you were truly resting or just delirious from the wine.”

“Lloyd, what did I say?” she repeated, her pout plastered on her face.

He sighed, knowing that he wouldn’t be able to evade her when she was that insistent. “A lot. Bad memories, it seemed like. You were putting yourself down unfairly.”

Like how he’d seen a week ago, the natural markings on her skin resembling tattoos began to fluctuate from their usual crimson color. The way the various shades of red subtly spread, in contrast to the dark grey complexion of her skin, looked beautiful even when he knew she was blushing from embarrassment he hadn’t wanted to cause. What he’d witnessed the night before really had been something he wasn’t supposed to hear or see.

He sat up and waited for her to follow suit. “I’m sorry,” she said shamefully. The way her eyes were downcast stung him.

“No, I don’t accept that,” he replied, causing her to pick her head up slightly. She looked confused. “You did absolutely nothing wrong; everybody has their low points. I don’t agree with you insulting yourself last night, and I don’t agree with you apologizing now.”

Even when she looked so dejected, there was a little glimmer in her eye, and she seemed comforted to some extent. “That’s sweet of you to say. But you don’t know who I am, Lloyd. And your view would change if you did.”

“You assume too much about me. As much as I don’t know your past, you also don’t know mine. You don’t know how I judge people, whether on their past or their present. You don’t know how I’d react simply because other people may have reacted to you in a certain way.”

To his surprise, she continued to look at him despite her anxiety. The resigned sadness in her eyes, so different from the fire he saw in her when she was in combat, didn’t make her shy to look him in the eye anymore. Her acceptance of being exposed made him feel even more sad for her, and he wondered if her recognition of that is what made her open up more easily.

“Lloyd…I know what I am. And right now, all I’m supposed to be is your guardian on your escape from this island. That’s all I’m destined for. That’s all I can ever be. And there’s a reason for that. Knowing who I really am won’t benefit you. Don’t pursue it.”

“You’re the one who brought up knowing you, Tammy,” he replied. Her sadness chipped and splintered at his challenge. “Yes, really. I do want to know who you are, by the way, but I didn’t pursue it. In fact, I’ve done everything I can to respect your privacy. You bringing it up makes me feel like you want to talk - just in your own terms, not while drunk or sleep talking.”

“Talking doesn’t benefit,” she said while shaking her head.

“How do you know if you don’t try? Why bring it up if you’re not curious? Maybe we’d work better as a team if we could just talk normally, and not second guess if we’re saying-“

“Personal matters aren’t related to my mission,” she insisted. She’d interrupted, but at least her mood was picking up. “You knowing my past won’t help us escape Summerset any quicker or more efficiently.”

“It’s not necessarily about that, Tammy. It’s about trust. It’s about comfort. It’s about seeing each other as people with motivations and needs, and not just a war spirit and outlaw magician hiking down the road toward a portal. It’s about having a reason to stick together until this is done no matter what.” In the moment, he reached for her hand and held it without thinking. She blushed again, but he didn’t let go. “Look, don’t feel pressured to say anything dark or bad. I’m just saying that I think you wouldn’t mind the ability to talk freely, which is why you brought up the possibility me knowing who you really are. Or what you think you really are. So…look. We’re going to be busy finishing in the basement today, right? You don’t say a thing if you don’t truly feel like it, and I’ll never hold it against you. But if I feel like blabbing about my traveling the world, where I was during the Invasion of Coldharbour, why I left my family…then you’ll listen and won’t judge me harshly. Maybe you’ll find it pleasant. Maybe you’ll trust me more as a partner if you know who I really am. It’s up to you what you feel like saying.

“Would that be okay with you?”

She stared at him for a long time. He could see the curiosity bubbling beneath the surface, but she restrained herself from revealing what exactly she thought. At the minimum, though, he saw her anxiety go away.

“You can say whatever you want,” she replied after thinking over what he’d said for some time. “It’s okay with me.”

“Sounds like a plan.” He smiled and so did she, and the two of them just sat there on the bedding for a while. “This is nice, isn’t it-“

“Are you two awake yet?” asked Lace from the other side of the door, interrupting their moment. “I have a few new things to say about last night. Dreamer, are you awake?”

Tammaeroth frowned, though there was a good nature to the expression. Lloyd squeezed her hand and stood up to get dressed.

“Good luck, by the way,” he chortled while getting ready. Tammaeroth almost smiled in a self deprecating fashion.

“I never have good luck,” she sighed.


	34. Wanderer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The topic of where they came from - or where one of them came from - comes up.

Well before noon, the two of them had nearly finished cleaning up the basement. Every shelf had been straightened, every box had been labeled, every item type had been sorted, and racks of costumes, fabrics, and regular clothes had been lined up according to purpose. The job had taken them a few days, but they’d finally organized the basement in the Manor of Masques. Tammaeroth had always known they could; Lloyd hadn’t believed it until they were finished.

The two of them sat on two stools they’d repaired and rested while looking over the results of their work. They were both dog tired and thirsty, but Tammaeroth fidgeted in her stool, a sharp contrast to her usual stoic stillness. Lloyd was too dazed by the hours of work they’d done since breakfast to notice her behavior until she turned to face him.

“There are many topics in the world,” she said spontaneously and without prompting.

Without context, he didn’t understand her at first and took her statement as her attempt at humor. “Indeed, there are many clouds in the sky,” he said with a grin. He stared up at the ceiling until he noticed her giving him a funny look. “I’m sorry, I thought you were making a joke.”

“No, it wasn’t…I didn’t mean it to be funny.” She didn’t say anything further and just sat with her hands folded in her lap, which was a more passive body language than she usually displayed. She transitioned between glancing over at him and then her shoes, and he finally understood.

“You’re referring to our conversation after we woke up this morning?” he asked.

“I guess. Maybe.”

“It doesn’t have to be maybe. It’s alright to bring up a subject in conversation if you feel the need to talk.”

She looked away from him, though she didn’t seem shy so much as cautious. “It’s not my habit,” she said while shrugging.

“The world is full of new experiences,” he said, snapping her to attention. “Come on now, I’m only joking. With you, not at you.”

“That’s not my habit, either. But…it’s not a bad habit.” She fell silent again and continued staring at the recently organized shelves. He’d have to take the lead this time.

“I was worried that Lace had exhausted your patience for talk.”

She finally did smile and enjoyed the joke. “She did. She just wanted me to listen to how her evening had been ruined; she didn’t have a point to make.” Tammaeroth sighed and relaxed. “But it’s been a few hours.”

“So you’re good to talk?” he asked, but she only bit her lower lip. She looked adorable, if an incredibly violent demon could be described in such a way, but he didn’t want to leave her to squirm. “How about I explain why I left my family to see the world?”

“That’s better,” she replied swiftly.

“Very well, then.” He turned to face her and extended his hand. “My name is Lloyd Rolsen. I’m thirty years old and a citizen of the Daggerfall Covenant.”

She actually recoiled from him, staring at him as if he were offering her expired food. “I know who you are, Lloyd…” Her voice trailed off while she stared at him, her face a shifting tapestry of reactions. By the third shift in her expression, her thick lips curled into that pretty smile again, so wide that he could see her molar teeth. “Wait…that’s a joke, isn’t it?”

He smiled back, and for the first time, she did something incredible. Her mouth opened as if to speak, but no coherent words came out. Rather, the sound was a pleasant one with the echoing cadence of her vocal cords, higher in pitch than usual. The songlike sound was, as he realized, laughter. After a week of constantly being around each other, and sharing almost every moment waking and sleeping, he’d finally managed to tickle her funny bone.

She noticed him staring at her before he realized he was doing it, and even as she continued, she spoke. “What is it?” she asked.

“I like the way you laugh,” he said. His answer was straightforward and without pretense, as he often was in private, and he wasn’t ready when she started to blush again.

She cleared her throat. “Nice to meet you,” she replied while playing with a strand of her hair. She couldn’t look at him, but she hadn’t retreated into her shell either. “Tell me why you left your family.”

“They’re crazy.”

“Don’t disrespect your family, Lloyd!” she exclaimed, much to his amusement. “Why are you laughing? I’m being serious.”

“Sorry. I suppose defending them is the honorable thing to do. Anyway, where do you want me to start?”

She looked at him like a smart person saying something stupid, as she’d done (and then stopped doing). “Start at why you left your family! Why won’t you answer me?”

“Tammy, it’s a broad question. I left because they were disappointed in my choices.”

Right at is first sentence of explanation, she halted all banter and looked pensive. He forced himself to maintain a straight face, for her sudden change in mood did seem a little funny, but he didn’t want to upset her. “If they were disappointed, then you should have tried to please them. Leaving them is the opposite of finding a solution.”

“Why are you so defensive of my family when you haven’t met them?”

“You’re changing the subject. Why didn’t you try to please your family?”

“Because I was truly unhappy with what they wanted. Look…Bretons, as a nation, usually respect magical arts, even when not all of them can use magic. You know that about us, right?”

“Sort of. I’ve heard that,” she replied.

“Right. Well, my family is different. They’re all in the military or police, at some level. Maybe as a career, maybe as a period before another step, but everybody is involved. The same was expected of me. Like many sorcerers, I showed magical talent without the need for practice, but my dad ignored that. My parents basically forced me to join the city guard for Daggerfall. I was busting drunks, doing lots and lots of walking, and carrying out routine executions.”

“An honorable profession.”

“Maybe. Maybe. But it wasn’t for me. Tammy, I was sixteen years old when I executed a criminal for the first time. He was a murderer, and I believe he deserved it, but not from a teenager; you know what we mortals are like. We’re born without pre-existing knowledge. We’re blank slates, largely innocent from reality, and tastes of reality shock us. I couldn’t go to work for two days after I killed for the first time; I was sicker than you were when you drank last night. It’s been almost fifteen years, and I’m still uncomfortable with those memories. They haunt me on those nights when I can’t sleep easily.”

“No, it’s…Hmm. I am…sorry for your memories. Bad ones are the most difficult to forget.”

“Should we forget the bad ones? I don’t know,” he sighed. “Perhaps there are lessons to be learned. At the minimum, we learn what not to do in the future.”

Her shoulders slumped. “That’s a meaningless lesson,” she sighed right back, speaking volumes of her own bad memories without directly telling him. He decided not to prod her, though, and let her make whatever comments she wished.

“We define meaning for ourselves. If we choose not to find it, then we won’t. And to tell you the truth, I chose not to. I dropped out of the city guard after my two year contract finished. Other people in my family only stayed in the police or military temporarily, but I had to state openly that such a life wasn’t for me and that I wished to study. I pushed the issue. That’s really what soured things - my parents felt that I was disrespecting family tradition.”

“Then you should have stayed quiet and shown respect to your parents,” she said. Her tone wasn’t accusatory, but he could see how firmly she held her beliefs on clan and family loyalty.

“What happened, happened. I thought that being honest would make them happy, but it didn’t. For a while, things were manageable. I joined a private study circle led by an old mage. When I began to excel, my parents felt like they were losing, so they demanded that I pay rent. That’s not a part of Breton culture. Not. At. All. Children don’t pay their parents to live with them, period, no matter how old we are. Even if we get married and our spouse moves into our parents house with us, a parent doesn’t demand rent money from their child.”

“So your parents violated the rules of your society?”

“Yes. They wanted to stop me in what they saw as a battle of wills. I dropped out of the study circle because I didn’t have time and couldn’t afford it; half my day went to a part time job as a librarian’s assistant and whipping boy, and most of the money I earned went to my parents. I ended up paying another student to share his notes with me and let me sit in on his practice sessions, which wasn’t as helpful. I didn’t give up, though, which upset my parents even more. By the time I turned twenty, I couldn’t walk in through the front door without an argument starting. I had this one marathon argument with my brother that lasted for three hours, to the point where I missed one of my practice sessions I’d paid for; I think he planned it that way. The whole family made it their goal to make me miserable until I would give up everything I liked and do what they wanted.”

In a curious twist of behavior, Tammaeroth didn’t look away from him as he spoke. The same sadness he’d felt for her seem mirrored in the way her brow furrowed and knit into a frown; he couldn’t recall seeing a less restrained display of emotion from her. “I don’t know how to feel about that,” she said. “You were wrong to leave an honorable lifestyle held by an honorable family, but your family’s treatment of you can’t be explained in light of their profession. Their behavior contradicts the type of values that soldiers should uphold.”

“We mortals are crazy, don’t you know that? We’re all crazy and irrational. Complete freedom from oaths and binding does that to people.”

“You smile about this very easily, yet it seems like your parents hurt you deeply because you left at a young age for mortals.”

He chuckled, half nervous and half resigned to his lot in life. He wondered if he was channeling her now. “I don’t believe in fate, but I do believe in circumstance. Chance and happenstance led me through all of that. It is what it is. But I never give up on hope, nor do mortals in general; it defines us. I’m sure you can understand if you have experience with Mehrunes Dagon…he’s the lord of hope as much as he is-“

“Subject change, please, please,” she said nervously, waving her hand in the air.

“Right, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to switch to that-“

She was doing much better in managing her anxiety, because she was very visibly experiencing it despite pushing herself to stay in the conversation. “Please, you turned twenty. Go back to that.”

“So for two years, I put up with all of that,” he said while gripping her shoulder and shaking it twice. “It was enough. I decided that if I really wanted to pursue my studies, I’d have to leave. Daggerfall has a very active port scene, so I started saving money and making contacts. I secured passage on a ship with a trader who knew one of the few wizards on Stross M’kai, and I left a letter for my family on the night that we sailed out.”

“Lloyd, no.”

“Wait, it was a positive letter. I didn’t mention any of the bad times.”

“No, no. That’s too far. You didn’t even give them a chance to bid you farewell.”

“Because I thought they would have taken more drastic measures. Look, it was ten years ago; I was less mature and less confident back then. I did what I had to in order to pursue my passion. And until today, Stross M’kai is one of my favorite cities on Nirn. I discovered who I was while there. I discovered my love of the forbidden.”

“No, you-“ She stopped herself from her expected string of no’s, intrigued by his statement. “Forbidden what, Lloyd?”

“Knowledge, of course. Isn’t that why you were sent to protect me?” She bristled, taken aback by the speed of the subject change. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ambush you. Anyway, forbidden knowledge. I stayed in Stross M’kai for eight years; I will tell you without exaggeration that I read every single book in every single shop and inn on that island. It isn’t exactly known for libraries, but between my work as an assistant and janitor for a crochety old wizard and the social life that comes with living in a pirate city, I spent my time reading. I found books locked up in the weirdest places, some of them banned in the rest of Covenant territory. That’s when I began researching Dragon Breaks, as well as alternate cosmologies. I found challenges to the division of aedra and daedra as arbitrary, claims that Anu and Padomay are baseless concepts, transcripts of debates on whether Nirn revolves around Magnus or the other way around…those topics became the only ones I was interested in anymore.”

“Then why did you come to a place like this? You must have known that you’d get in trouble.”

“I came here so I could meet you,” he replied.

He clenched his teeth to avoid laughing at his own joke, and she actually did need a second to get it before she began to laugh again as well. Her nose scrunched up but her eyebrows arched, irritation mixing with her laughter when she failed to stop herself. “You don’t know the…I’m being serious!” she chortled, breathing heavily as small laughs escaped the corner of her mouth.

“Alright, Alright. I came here because it was easy: the Dominion opened this island to immigrants, and it’s obviously a magic-rich environment. I figured that I’d be caught up in the influx of other foreigners here and ignored, and if not, then I’d have a little adventure.”

“It’s not an adventure. You can die. And you can’t die.”

“All of us die, Tammy; that’s what life in Mundus is like. If I die while exploring the world and discovering new information, snatching up banned reading material, then I’d die happy. I’d rather go out doing what I like than in a Justiciar jail cell, or patrolling streets again.”

“None of those things will happen,” she said while straightening up. “Not for now. Not on this island. Not on my mission.”

“You’re a master of building suspense,” he chuckled while standing up and stretching.

She furrowed her brow while watching him stand. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, nothing. I was making a joke about this mysterious mission of yours. Or, the mysterious origins. If you ever want to tell me about it, then I’d love to hear about it. I’m done for now, though; you know all there really is of importance to Lloyd Rolsen’s life.”

Despite him standing, she remained seated and shrank away from him. “You…want me to talk about my mission?” she asked hesitantly.

“Hey, only if you want to. If you’re comfortable telling, I’m all ears. If you want to go up to be early for lunch, I’m also hungry.”

She shook her head. “You’re upset at me, aren’t you?”

“I swear I’m not,” he chuckled while sitting back down again. “I mean it. You choose what we do next, I’m okay with anything.”

“You’ll resent me if I don’t reciprocate now.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Because I know all that’s important in Lloyd Rolsen’s life,” she said, breaking into laughter, albeit nervous, in the middle of her sentence.

“And did anything I said paint me as a resentful person?”

“No, but…people become upset at imbalance.”

He smiled and looked down demurely. “Not everybody takes personal relations as a balance sheet,” he said softly. “If one deals with a merchant, or anybody else who’s needed but not wanted, relations can be transactional. Other types of relations don’t need to be a transaction. Make of my - admittedly non-expert - philosophy of life what you will.” She looked down as well, staring at her shoes and seeming rather thoughtful. “How about we go up for lunch after all that work?”

“Yes, sure,” she sighed.

“I’m not upset, I swear.”

She inspected every inch of her shoes even when letting a hint of a smile touch her face. “I believe you,” she sighed again.

“Come on, let’s get some water and think about lighter topics. There’s no reason to linger here anxiously.”

She nodded and rose to stand, clearly preferring not to talk at the moment. In another first, she actually reached for his hand instead of the other way around, and she tugged for him to follow. “I feel like talking, but not now,” she said without looking at him.

“I believe you,” he said politely.


	35. Open and Shut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1\. I’m working on a huge assignment for school and I’m not done yet.  
> 2\. I need to keep the rhythm of this going.  
> 3\. Short chapters are fun.  
> 4\. Alchemy needs her moment before serious business occurs.

Work happened, as it did with many people, and both Lloyd and Tammaeroth found themselves split up after lunch. While he’d been tasked with healing one of the house’s dancers after a hard fall at the theatre during rehearsals, she had been roped in by Alchemy into a tour of the basement. Over the past week, Tammaeroth had gotten used to speaking to mortals without Lloyd’s support, as she’d once been, provided that she didn’t have to speak at length. However, Alchemy needed to take inventory of the house’s props and supplies in the basement, and the pair couldn’t avoid extended conversation.

After half an hour of discussion regarding the location of every item, Tammaeroth had become visibly irritable. Alchemy recognized the great effort required on the part of the Dremora to remain civil after such an interrogation. Despite her own unease around the demon, Alchemy also knew that she was the only person there - in the end - who was responsible for keeping the peace. With a deep breath, she decided to break the awkward silence which had descended on them after Tammaeroth’s last curt answer to the list of stock questions.

The Altmer leaned against the wall near the stairs leading out, playing her casual act as well as she could when faced with the cross-armed, pouty demon. “Dreamer, you really have done a great job,” Alchemy said, “both down here and upstairs.”

Though the Dremora didn’t turn to face her, Alchemy could see the movement of a raised eyebrow through the plain mask’s eyeholes. “The kitchen work is adequate,” Tammaeroth replied flatly and with disinterest.

Alchemy shook her head. “I wasn’t referring to that, though you did a good job in there too. I’m talking about the house itself. With everybody.”

Tammaeroth’s eyes continued to focus on the wall in front of her, still as a statue. The likeliness of a person holding a castle gate closed wouldn’t have captured her demeanor accurately enough, so much was her recalcitrance to praise. She didn’t even bother thanking Alchemy, bothering the Altmer with her ingratitude. Ever mindful of social stability, though, Alchemy gave the Dremora another proverbial push.

“I know that adaptation to our society must be difficult for you,” Alchemy said. “I’m happy to see that you’ve fit in with everybody so well. You should feel proud of your ability to cope with new situations.”

Arms still folded, Tammaeroth became visibly nervous by the complement. Her shoulders tightened in posture, her shirt stretched, and she fidgeted as if she had too much energy. To Alchemy’s own disappointment, she found herself surreptitiously preparing a shield spell in the event that the demon next to her suddenly decided to stop getting along so well. Such a misfortune didn’t occur, however; Tammaeroth simply continued to fidget and squirm uncomfortably, fighting an internal battle over how to respond to a mortal telling her nice things.

Alchemy wanted to both leave on a good note and save her demonic guest any further discomfort, and so she took a step back while waving. Tammaeroth actually turned her head to look at the elven host, a mixture of both defensive posturing and perhaps a wistful, reluctant isolation weakly glimmering in the demons mostly black eyes.

“I just wanted to say that you have a form of support here. Your work is excellent, and your manner with the others has exceeded my initial expectations. Perhaps that isn’t necessarily news, but everyone deserves to know when they’re appreciated.”

Tammaeroth’s eyes flitted down to Alchemy’s shoes and then the stairs behind her. Ever so slightly, her gate cracked open in reaction to the high elf stepping back and putting space between them. That gate lingered open for only a few seconds, but during those few seconds, Alchemy was able to see a person rather than just a demon.

“Thank…s,” Tammaeroth replied awkwardly and unnaturally (though not insincerely).

Satisfied that her mildly stressful effort had made about an ounce of difference, Alchemy nodded and started up the stairs. “You’re most welcome, Dreamer. Thank you for changing the mess down here into something workable.” Halfway up the stairs, Alchemy looked back. “Listen, there’s no rush on the attic. I trust you to complete the work efficiently based on what I’ve seen here. Consider the rest of the afternoon to be yours to manage as you see fit.”

With that, the high elf took her leave, heading back upstairs, taking a deep breath, and extinguishing her shield spell. The Dremora remained in the basement, not moving from that spot for a long time.


	36. Tammaeroth’s Story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The most honestly titled chapter so far is also the longest. It’s kind of ironic - Lloyd is my main in the game and Tammaeroth is headcanon of a Dremora Churl he summons, yet the latter is better developed as a character and backstory. Here’s a part of that backstory (though a considerable part).

In the late afternoon, Lloyd found himself trying to sort out the chaos of the attic in the Manor of Masques, staring at the dusty sacks of random crafting materials crammed under the triangular ceiling of the room. Prevented from even starting by procrastination, he felt a sense of relief when he heard the sound of another person walking up the stairs; even if their arrival meant that he had to get to work, the distraction of another person there to talk to would preoccupy him while performing the repetitive task.

The particular footstep pattern of Tammaeroth alerted him to who it was joining him, and he picked up a few items to look as if he’d been hard at work. Her sense for spatial organization was as strong as her sense of direction was weak, and she’d outshined him every day they’d worked in the basement. He didn’t want to seem like he was falling too far behind her in terms of work done, thus he fiddled around with a sack full of nails-

“Hello,” she said upon entering the attic fully, interrupting his thoughts. Hands folded in front of her, she waited expectantly for a reply, and he put the sack of nails down.

“Hey there. It’s been a few hours, hasn’t it?” he asked. She only nodded in response and said nothing, though he didn’t figure out what she wanted right away. “Well, I was at the theatre earlier. We had to move Feathermoth to his bed over here after a rehearsal mishap. What have you been up to?”

Hands still folded, she seemed to be acting unnaturally. “I have not been up to something much,” she replied awkwardly. She was clearly trying to speak casually, which was a rarity from her. He sat on one of the rickety old chairs in the attic which he’d left by the wall, hoping she’d feel more comfortable sitting down. She continued standing, looking rather reserved, until he wiggled an empty chair (one of the less damaged ones) for her to sit. “Thanks,” she said while taking a seat. There was an uptight air about her; he knew she was sincere, but the notion of relaxed, open conversation was still alien to her. He respected how hard she was trying.

“Tell me about your day so far,” he said once she’d taken a seat, facing slightly away from him with her ankles crossed.

She shrugged and loosened up every so slightly, though there was a delay in her speech as she thought too much about everything she said. “It was good. I have decided that I will avoid harming Alchemy in any possible circumstance.” Her tone was finally casual, and though her statement would have scared anyone else, he understood it to be Tammaeroth’s version of friendliness.

“That’s great! I’m glad to hear that. What did she tell you?”

“She likes my work. I felt good when she said that. I would prefer that her inevitable death is delayed for as long as is possible for mortals, and that she is able to reconcile her loss of life with satisfaction at achievements.”

Assuming that Tammaeroth meant ‘I wish Alchemy the best,’ Lloyd nodded and didn’t comment on the curiously daedric wording. “I’m sure that she holds a similar sentiment to you. She respects hard work as well as discretion. You know, I think you and her are similar in that sense; you both keep secrets.”

Tammaeroth bristled adorably, if those two words could be strung together. “I’m not like her. She’s skinny and lacks desire for confrontation.”

“No…I know, I didn’t mean that,” he replied while stifling a laugh with only partial success. “I didn’t mean you’re like her in all qualities. You’re like her in that you also respect privacy and maintain secrecy when…when…it’s tactically necessary. I hope that way of putting it makes sense.”

“Yes, I like that wording better.” Tammaeroth didn’t say anything further, sitting and facing on an angle slightly away from Lloyd, glancing at him every so often.

He took his mask off to feel more comfortable himself, but Tammaeroth kept hers on. “Do you feel like talking right now?”

“Yes,” she answered, suddenly without hesitation. She tapped her foot nervously and stared at the wall.

“I feel like listening, so I think you’re lucky.”

“No,” she replied. “That word doesn’t apply to me.” He didn’t smile, but he looked her over politely. “You can ask me.”

“I don’t want to pressure you.”

“It’s not pressure; I…” She paused and cleared her throat, visibly anxious. “I need you to ask me. I can’t…I can’t talk,” she said with difficulty, like she was fighting her own mouth to get the words out. “I’ve never talked. About…things on my mind. Ever. I don’t know how, and I feel like my throat is crushing itself when I do. It’s not magical, it’s just me. So…”

She shook her head at nothing and paused for a whole minute. She wasn’t emotional or disturbed - she was just too anxious to speak. He could imagine the feeling of itchy clawing inside. Lloyd had never felt social anxiety himself, but he’d tried to help people through it before, and their general manner - like Tammaeroth’s at that moment - gave him the mental image of a person’s soul clawing to escape their body.

Without a word, he pulled his hopeful mask back over his head. She finally turned to look at him straight in the eye, and just held his gaze for a moment.

The tension in her neck and shoulders dissipated. “Thank you,” she said shyly.

“It’s quite alright. You mentioned that you’ve never talked out loud about what’s inside?” he asked calmly as if nothing had happened.

She took a deep breath and sounded like she laughed again, though not loudly enough for him to hear the sound. “Yes, that’s right,” she said, and after a brief pause, she continued. “Look. Right now, I’m bound to Mundus for the time being, but that binding doesn’t affect my speech. This isn’t in my animus; I’m just not the type to talk like this. Not for a long, long time. Please, ask me. I can’t talk just because. I need to feel like my words aren’t…like they’re not unwanted.”

“That’s really normal, to be honest, Tammy. It’s okay. But if I ask, then I want to ask from the beginning. Is that alright?”

She nodded, stuttering at first but quickly controlling her speech. “That’s fine.”

“Good. So, about your origin. When I mentioned Mehrunes Dagon-“ She did a double take, and he laid a hand on her shoulder. “Is that off limits?”

She reached up to brush her hair away only to realize that her mask’s hood covered all of it. “Please, push me. Don’t let me avoid this. I’ll never talk about it on my own,” she replied nervously. However, she didn’t shrink away from him, and began breathing slowly to calm herself down.

“You’re very brave, Tammy.” She only nodded and played with her hood, leaving him to push her as she’d asked. “You told me that you arose, were formed, however you term it, three thousand years ago in Nirn time, but that it feels more like three hundred years to you. Right?”

“Right.”

“When you…arose, awakened from the Void, did you take form in the Deadlands?”

“Yes,” she said, rapidly tapping her foot again.

“Why do you feel stressed out when I ask?”

She turned her head away and laughed. The pleasant sound was self-deprecating, like she was shaking her head at herself. “It’s not complicated. It’s just painful. The Deadlands were my home. My clan was there. I lost everything.” She laughed again, her voice touched with sorrow. “It sounds so…silly and minor when I say it out loud.”

“It’s not,” he said. “Loss hurts.”

“Well, I lost a lot. I lost everything. Everything. Everything,” she repeated, almost with disinterest once she got speaking. She shook her head an awful lot as she reminisced about her past. “Life was never simple. That hasn’t really changed. I don’t remember much about my entrance into Aurbis…sort of like a mortal as a baby. I mean, I arose mature and with preexisting knowledge, like I once told you, but the beginning is hazy like a baby’s first memories. I just remember the clan wars.”

“Were those a big deal in the Deadlands at the time?”

“No, you don’t get it. It wasn’t one time, it was all the time. The clan wars aren’t a specific series of wars, they’re just normal, everyday behavior for Dremora under Lord Dagon. As much as you mortals fight wars between countries on Nirn, our clans fight each other in the Deadlands. It isn’t even scheming and politics like in Coldharbour; in the Deadlands, the Dremora clans fight outright wars against each other without subtlety or pretense. All the time. All. The. Time. We took land, we lost land, we imprisoned each other…” A wistful look, not sad but perhaps missing a beloved memory, overtook her eyes, the only part of her he could see due to her mask. “It was great. We mounted assaults on each other that we can never do to Mundus because we were all right there in the same dimension. We won some, we lost some, but we never worried. Not my clan and not others. Lord Dagon was pleased that we were honing our skills, and alliances shifted so much that clans usually couldn’t get the upper hand for long. News traveled fast and kept us busy.”

She sighed - a sincere, deep sigh, not a demonstration or signal. “Usually. For a long time, my clan entered into a losing streak. There was no reason…no conspiracy or curse on us. It was pure luck. For decades, not one decade but several, we only lost. Our territory was taken, we reverted to nomadism, and most of us spent years in and out of imprisonment at the forts of rival clans. And then…then…then…” She cleared her throat uncomfortably. “Lord Dagon removed his favor from us. We’d lost too many times.”

“I’m really sorry to hear that,” he said. “I can imagine that a loss like that would be hard to talk about.”

“We deserved it, though; I have no outside force to blame. Lord Dagon was culling the inferior. The loss of his favor wasn’t what makes it hard for me to talk, though. It was the loss of my clan. That didn’t have to happen. We could have remained as outcasts and vagabonds, as we had been for what felt like a number of years, weak but not alone. We don’t love our clans, but we feel a loyalty beyond what mortals can know…a sense of duty which is maybe comparable to love. No matter how long I spent running in the volcanic wastes, hiding in crevices and surviving on sticks and roots, the notion that we could help just one or two more kin escape the jails of other clans gave us hope. Mehrunes Dagon is the lord of hope as much as the lord of destruction…we were happy. We were living as Dremora do, in difficulty and ease.

“Until we were lost. My clan was…betrayed. Badly. Ultimately. In the worst possible way for a daedra. My clan was killed.”

Lloyd was leaning forward, rubbing his palms together and staring at the floorboards as he listened. “I’m assuming that you mean permanently killed, without reforming. But how? Are the theories of the Sojourner correct?”

She waved his question away. “I don’t know who that is, but yes, there are ways to kill us rather than merely banishing us, and it’s horrifying. Don’t think that mortals fear death; the notion of permanent death, without being reborn in Chaotic Creatia, scares us more than you can understand. It scares us because we live our lives based on the assumption that we will always live on even if our bodies are destroyed. Vaermina herself can’t scare a daedra as much as the threat of permanent death scares us. We live forever, reforming when we die; the notion of an end isn’t in our minds. To die permanently, to be absorbed into the Void, for animus and consciousness to crumble and cease to exist…I wouldn’t wish that on anybody, not even my worst foe. Yet it happened…my clan was betrayed, transported to a plane of Aetherius in a plot where they would be killed by the inhabitants there.”

“That’s the Sojourner’s theory - that a daedra killed in Aetherius won’t reform,” Lloyd said. “I’m so, so sorry to hear this.”

“Thanks…even now, I no longer mourn, but I feel the loss in my heart. The people who were my world for centuries will never come back; only myself and three others from the clan, formerly in the hundreds, survived. We had nothing, less than nothing, negative protection. Other clans went from fighting us to spurning us, hating us. I just couldn’t…I couldn’t even.” She shifted in her chair and tried to stretch her shoulders, which had been tensed on and off for a while. “It was horrible, losing my clan and then being hated more than mortals. We weren’t even hunted, we were exterminated. I died many times…I reformed as normal, but dying and reforming is a terrifying experience for us, as I think you know, because we don’t have full consciousness and don’t know if we’re being reborn or slipping into the Void while our physical bodies are molding around our vestiges. It’s not as scary as permanent death, not even comparable, but it’s like a nightmare - even if it’s not real, it’s scary during the process because you don’t know that it’s not real. But my fellows and I couldn’t help each other with so few in number, and there were times where we’d be found and killed just days after reforming, putting us into a loop that was like what mortals consider Hell. I couldn’t take it, and I felt weak because I couldn’t take it. I was so disappointed that I made a bad decision.”

“Many people make poor decisions when they need help; I’ve done it, too. But what happened?”

“Desperation happened. After years of trying, myself and the three other survivors of the clan kidnapped a mage from a weak but existing clan. We forced him to do something no daedra would normally ever want.”

“What was that?”

“We forced him to help us get summoned by mortals,” she said, turning to face him when he looked up curiously. “Yes, it’s possible, but nobody does it because we all hate conjurers. I don’t know how it works…I’m not great at magic, but the usual ley lines cutting into Oblivion when conjuration magic enters from Mundus can apparently be detected. We held that mage for weeks and tortured him until he actually reached out into Mundus and essentially forced us onto hapless conjurers. We were split up and sent apart…I got summoned by this old mage in Bangkorai.”

“Is that when you lived with mortals like you told me?”

“Yes. She was this old lady, one of your people, who ran a mage tower out in the middle of nowhere. She had a lot of students and servants coming and going, and I was summoned by a student. The lady immobilized me, and I pleaded with her to keep me. I didn’t exactly degrade myself, but I was so desperate that I offered my martial services in a way I don’t think I could do again. Convincing a stranger that I’m actually useful and shouldn’t be thrown away felt so undignified, I don’t know what I would have done if she’d said no. But she said yes, and promised to find a way to bind me to Mundus if I gave her ten continuous years of unpaid service as the mage tower’s security guard.”

“That’s amazing. And congratulations, by the way. It’s not a miracle since you planned your escape from the Deadlands logically, but it’s certainly an amazing feat. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything like it.”

“It didn’t feel amazing. It felt undignified and desperate. But it worked. I spent ten years patrolling a tower that wasn’t threatened by anything more than squirrels, all the while letting my combat skills rust, gaining weight, and losing my situational awareness. I even forgot how to cast fire spells because I became so…complacent. Life was okay, I guess. The mage was polite, and the students left me alone. I had food and shelter, so my basic needs were fulfilled even if the mage made it clear that she was my employer and not my friend. I was lonely for the first time in my life, but that was just whining. I’d escaped from Hell and had no reasons to complain. Life was stable until the mage started dying of old age.”

“And that was before I was born?” Lloyd asked.

“Oh yes. It was a long time ago, even by my standard and especially because I’d never spent much time in Mundus. It felt like a really long time because everything is linear on this plane. She kept her word, though, and she located someone who could help me at the end of my ninth year of service. Someone who could keep me from shifting back into the Deadlands. Someone who was just like me. A Dremora who’d chosen her own path, and joined some cult of mortal weirdos called the Primeval Seekers.”

“That’s Hermaeus Mora’s cult!”

“Yes…I didn’t know that they’re famous.”

“Trust me, they’re not, except to those of us who take an interest in the bizarre and mysterious,” Lloyd said.

“Well, that wasn’t me at the time. The mage began dying of natural causes, and she proved to be a person of honor. That year, the crazy Reachmen invaded, but she didn’t keep me indentured at the tower. She absolutely could have if she’d chosen…I was a daedra stuck on Nirn with no clan, nothing to my name, and no legal rights.”

“I’m glad to hear that you were treated fairly, then. So…wow, the invasion of the Reachmen was in year 541 of the Second Era. That was more than a whole decade before I was born. And this other Dremora, she brought you into the Primeval Seekers?”

Over time, Tammaeroth had ceased her nervous tapping, but she crossed her arms uncomfortably again in light of the newer topic. “No, she didn’t. The Breton lady only arranged a meeting nearby, but the other kin…Kixathi, her name was. She didn’t know what to expect and wanted to see what I was all about.” Tammaeroth paused for a moment and stared at the wall, deep in thought. Lloyd didn’t interrupt her, and this time, she didn’t need him to push her to talk once she’d recollected her ideas.

“Kixathi was a true kin. She was courteous and respectful, and she asked me to talk. But at that time, I couldn’t. Not to another Dremora. Not even now. My story was too embarrassing, plus Kixathi had never been to the Deadlands, so she would only know what I told her. I said that I was a refugee after clan wars, and that I was interested in the preservation of knowledge. It was a lie, but she didn’t know that. She figured out that my essence was still bound to the old Breton mage, who was dying, so Kixathi had me wait at the cult’s camp for a few days. A few stressful days which I spent alone, in a tent, wondering if I’d have anywhere to go; the mage tower was days of travel away and I didn’t know how to get back in case things didn’t work out.

“So after a few days, Kixathi found me and said that she arranged for me to meet a lesser demon of Apocrypha, but she couldn’t promise anything more. She remained very distant, emotionally I mean, and I got so worried because I thought she was expecting me to be rejected. The cultists transported me to Apocrypha, where I met my handler. This entity…not an aspect of Lord Mora, but a sort of lieutenant. Saei-Loa Nigh.”

Lloyd looked up again. “What,” he asked.

“Saei-Loa Nigh, the entity’s true name. I had to call it up from a pool of pen ink. It was just a mass of eyes and goo, and judgmental behavior. I thought that I would appeal directly to Hermaeus Mora, but the thing said that I wasn’t high profile enough. That meeting…it was the most embarrassing of my life, even more than the previous experiences I’ve mentioned.”

She paused for a long time with her head angled down. Her breathing seemed normal, and indeed, Tammaeroth had amazing control of her emotions, but she was visibly dejected. In another surprising attempt to reach out, she unfolded her hands and held one to the side, palm facing up next to Lloyd. He needed a few seconds to realize that she was reaching out, and he held her hand. There was no trembling or anxiety; she just seemed to crave contact.

“That thing, it was so condescending. Not rude, not disrespectful; it just looked at me the way that Dremora look at mortals. It spoke without a voice and asked me in my head, what could I offer? I said that I had experience working at a mage’s tower, but it said that I had nothing. I pleaded for anything and pledged to do whatever it demanded. I didn’t tell it everything I’ve told you now, and it didn’t care to ask. It just gave me a condition.

“I could stay in Apocrypha, but I couldn’t swear a binding oath to Lord Mora. My oath to Lord Dagon had been broken, which means that if I die, my vestige will float into obscure, masterless planes of Oblivion. I could be stuck in a worse place than the Deadlands. I asked that thing, that dismissive mass of eyeballs, what I had to do for my oath to be accepted. It knew that I was desperate for a home, but it didn’t care.

“Saei-Loa Nigh told me that if I could perform a single task that contributed to the preservation of forbidden knowledge, then I could swear my oath to Lord Mora and have my animus bound to Apocrypha. I’d have a home…a weird, slimy home that’s a bit boring, but a home.”

“You describe this creature as an unsympathetic figure; there’s a catch to the condition, right?” Lloyd asked.

“Of course. The catch was that my services weren’t actually needed. It let me in, as I figured out, due to respect for Kixathi, but it wasn’t interested in my skills.”

“It sounds bloody ignorant to be frank. That creature, I mean. It seems like the type to assume it knows everything and thus miss a lot of details.”

Tammaeroth laughed softly and looked down. “That’s kind of you to say, but all that matters is what that thing decides. I spent my days there paranoid all the time…a single slip into the ocean, a single fall down a staircase, a dispute with one of those Lurker things, and I’d die and reform in what could be an eternal prison on a random plane.”

Lloyd shook his head. “That’s not fair,” he said.

“That’s life,” she sighed. “And for what felt like a few months, I spent my life there in Apocrypha, patrolling back and forth, trying to get into reading, and serving that tentacle thing like its secretary. I did befriend a lot of the Lurkers, though. They’re actually quite nice, much nicer than the Seekers who don’t like to be bothered. And soon enough, I realized something.” She snorted while smiling beneath her mask. “Saei-Loa Nigh has no patience for interruption. Every time I’d ask it if there was any task for me to prove my worth, it would get irritated and tell me to pick up loose pages on the ground or rearrange the bookshelves. But I was desperate, and my desperation became a weapon. I bothered that eyeball thing like it was a clan war.”

She paused when Lloyd started laughing, and then laughed with him when she realized that he found it funny. “I’m being serious,” she chortled. “I’d wait until the most inconvenient times and the show up to its watchtower with a list of ideas for tasks, and it was so obsessed with rules and procedures that it listened to me every time even when it knew it would reject all of my suggestions. Eventually, I pissed it off so much that it began probing Nirn for examples of forbidden knowledge being sought without protection, violating an agreement with that clockwork god of the dark elves just to get rid of me.”

“A lieutenant of Hermaeus Mora violated the Coldharbour Compact with Sotha Sil just to get you out of its office,” Lloyd laughed politely. “Tammy, you’re my hero. That’s the most creative way to win a conflict I’ve ever heard of.”

“Thanks you. I was proud after having been denigrated by that thing so much. That’s when I learned, by the way, that I’d been in Apocrypha for forty years instead of four months; time is even weirder there than any other part of Oblivion due to Lord Mora’s control over spacetime. At least, I think that’s what the Seekers call it. So I found out that I’d been there for forty years, and all the mortals I’d ever met are surely dead. I felt happy that Saei-Loa Nigh finally began to actively search for a mission to give me, but I was a little sad. Not alone, but sad. Even the mortals in the Primeval Seekers whom I’d met are all probably dead. And then the ultimatum came to me.”

“Your mission?” Lloyd asked.

“My mission. Yes. That gooey bastard dumped me out of a portal near Shimmerene and got tough with me. It found you, somehow, through ways only creatures of Apocrypha could know. It was watching you, Lloyd, and watching these groups of people assemble to catch you without you knowing. Lord Mora detests censorship and suppression of information, so you fit a profile. Not a high profile, like me, which is why Saei-Loa told me the mission suits my rank. I was told that if I can get you off this island, safely to where you can live to read banned books another day, then I’ll have committed a good deed worthy enough for Apocrypha to become my home.”

“And if you don’t succeed?”

She bristled at his question. “Please, no.”

He shook his head, causing her to squeeze his hand in annoyance. “No, Tammy. You told me to push you, so now I’m pushing you. If we’re a team, and we’re in this together, then I want to know the stakes.”

“This question upsets me.”

“Tammy, you want to serve Hermaeus Mora?” She nodded. “Okay then, tell the truth. If there’s one thing Lord Mora isn’t known for, it’s avoiding inconvenient truths. Embrace the truth, share it with me, and let’s face it. Let’s own it. Let’s use that knowledge as power.” He held up her hand in his. “Let’s look this problem in the eye, know what we’re up against, and know how to win.”

She turned to face their hands clasped together, but she was looking straight at him. He’d seen her anxious before, but the look she gave him now was more raw. Less obvious, less intense, but very open and unveiled. She wasn’t afraid; she just looked resigned, like she was trapped in the Deadlands again.

“Swear to me that you’re not lying,” she demanded, though without the assertive power in her voice from the night they’d met.

“I swear, Tammy. I swear on whatever you want me to swear on, I’m a part of your team.”

She nodded, yet her eyes were marked with dread. “Saei-Loa Nigh told me that if I fail, then I’ll be cast out of Apocrypha forever…and then that lowdown drudge told me that it knew my reputation in Oblivion was bad due to losing my clan. It said that if I failed to earn a place in Apocrypha, then the rest of the daedric princes would blacklist me as well. Not because of an agreement, but just based on reputation. Then the portal closed, and I was left alone outside of Shimmerene with a thin skein to a transitional plane that will only open if you’re near it. And I was just so mad…and sad…and scared…because I know that what it told me is true.”

Slowly, Tammaeroth reached up and pulled her mask off. Her hair was a mess, her pout was more pronounced, and she looked too dejected to even express emotion in her voice. “Lloyd…please. And please. And pretty please. Do what I’m going to tell you now, and don’t argue.”

He pulled his mask off too. “Anything,” he replied.

Frowning, she spoke in a low voice marked with dread. “No matter what happens…you have to get off this island. Don’t ever falter, argue, or think you found an exception. If you think you’re in a situation which warrants changing the plan, you’re wrong. If you think a situation is a special case, you’re wrong. Even if the world is on fire, even if I’m eaten by a gryphon, even if you lose your legs in an accident, you crawl on your stomach and drag yourself to that portal. Because if you don’t…I’m finished. None of the princes of Oblivion will take me…I’ll be done for.”

“If I lose my legs and arms, I’ll roll my body through the portal,” he said with a smile. She didn’t laugh, but she became less serious. “I swear to you, I will do this. I quite enjoy my life, and I don’t want you to be condemned in yours. We’re going to do this.”

Her pout disappeared, and she looked at him expressionless, which was as good as she could get given the topic. “We will,” she replied hesitantly. He sensed her apprehension and tried to lighten up the atmosphere.

“Nice to meet you, Tammaeroth,” he said. She smiled and exhaled quickly through her nose.

“I guess you know who I am, now.”

“And I’m glad to know you; thank you for telling me. I don’t think I could maintain a conversation like that for that long.”

“I feel dizzy,” she chuckled. “I want tea.”

“Then we’re getting tea.” He nodded toward the door leading down from the attic, and they both rose and donned their masks. As they exited, she walked slowly and maybe even comfortably. The sense of dread left her, and even though the sense of resignation remained about her, it seemed less desperate and a little more hopeful.


	37. Waking Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was only a matter of time...
> 
> (Adult content warning)

In a deep, peaceful sleep, he dreamt of swirls and waves. Disembodied and without form, the colors and shapes floated around in his head as he laid motionless on the bedding. So still did he lay there, and so slowly did her movement begin, that neither of them even noticed the slight drift across the comforter they slept on.

Lazy and fluid, her movement began like one of the waves. Her mind sank further into unconsciousness, and neither of them realized when she rolled over so far that she began to share his pillow. Neither of them felt the gap between them close, neither of them noticed their increased pace of breathing, and neither of them noticed when he unconsciously tilted his body toward her too.

What she did notice, even when asleep, as the sensation of skin on skin. Though the night air wasn’t cold, and they’d even kicked their blankets off, her body still continued inching toward him minute by minute, all beyond the conscious control of either of them. When that first bit of of her sensitive underarm brushed against wrist, a part of her other than her autonomous thought woke up inside. She arched her back, not to stretch but to cover every conceivable space next to his body with hers. Her arm, her knee, her fingertips brushed his, rousing the same part of him despite his slumber.

They both turned in to each other and embraced, slowly but surely over several minutes. The palm of his hand, rougher than expected for a bookworm, brushed along the smooth skin of her lower back. She pressed herself flush against him, the fabric of her bra serving as the only barrier between her breast and his pectoral muscle. A long, deep breath escaped her lightly pursed lips, tickling his ear since her cheek had come to rest on his. His hand acted in its own accord, finding its way without direction as it slid from her lower back down inside the back of her underwear. That, in particular, was all her body could take.

Her legs slid apart and wedged around his, rubbing the inside of their thighs together as she took ahold of him. With every inch of depth her legs intertwined with his, his head began to turn. His nose and lips pressed into the flesh of her neck right behind her jawline; rather than kissing at first, he simply pressed into her, dreaming of pine scent and black roses while caressing her soft earlobe with the bridge of his nose. Her breathing hitched, pulling her into a limbo world between wake and asleep, feeling the results of her actions even when she was no longer in control.

She wrapped her legs around one of his and squeezed, pressing her core against the meat of his quadricep. She began to grind against him, eliciting a pleased growl as he wrapped both arms around her, however sloppily in his sleep, and pulled them tightly enough against each other to disturb the bedding beneath them. Even in the dark, even when they were both stuck between dream and reality, he found her thick lips and claimed them before she could react, suddenly more assertive than when he was while awake. She moaned into his mouth, too drowsy to fully realize what was happening yet alert enough to feel herself melt as he drank her kiss.

Pulling herself against him, her lips parted and she turned her head both directions, searching for his warmth when he moved downward. His warm breath spread over the center of her sternum, strangely pushing her away from consciousness and further into her dream state while every nerve ending of her skin just above her bra was set ablaze. His hand began to apply pressure, moving rhythmically and warming them both up for a midnight endeavor neither of them were yet fully aware of.

Until it all got ruined, because of course, how else could it end?

The light but urgent wrapping of knuckles on the door caused them both to yelp, dazed and confused as they rolled around and tried to find which way was up. She was still furiously dry humping his leg when the two of them both realized that they were alone, in their closet bedroom, and in a compromising situation.

“Paradox? Dreamer? It’s okay, it’s just me,” Larksong said from the other side of the door.

Rapidly rolling her head back and forth against her pillow, Tammaeroth grit her teeth angrily. “No, no, no no no no no!” she whispered into the darkness.

Lloyd, barely aware of his surroundings, what time it was, or what year they were even in, slumped into the blankets and breathed a long, drawn out sigh. “Why now of all times,” he whispered, though the two of them weren’t entirely cognizant of what the other was saying.

Larksong didn’t hear their complaining, though, and tapped her fingers on the door again. “Firebird caught a fever. I’ve tried applying a damp cloth, but he can’t sleep due to the cold chills. One of you knows how to cure illnesses, right?”

“Duty calls,” Lloyd whispered before sitting up in the bed. His boxer shorts looked like a circus tent. “Yes, I’m coming,” he told Larksong through the door.

Tammaeroth rolled over again, unsure of what to do with all her nervous energy and too sleepy to get up. She watched Lloyd wobble and stand up, her eyes bleary and unfocused. “Let him die,” she whispered angrily.

“We can’t,” he whispered back while bracing himself against the couch so he wouldn’t collapse. “I’ll be right back, really.”

She watched him throw on a bathrobe and cheap sandals along with his hopeful mask. Her head turned around to follow him, her jet black hair splayed all over the pillow in a sight so enticing that he stopped and considered ignoring the sick house member. Reminding him of the morning when she’d caught him watching her bathe, a sly, almost sultry look gleamed in her eye. Tammaeroth arched her back and slid on arm behind her head, stretching the fabric of her bra as she slid the tips of her index and middle fingers just barely inside the front of her panties.

“Don’t let them keep you…for too long,” she tried to say seductively, but she ended up yawning at the end in a sad foreshadowing of their interrupted privacy.

He yawned too, cursing their luck under his breath. “I won’t,” he said without conviction, watching her as he slid out the door.


	38. Shattered Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The reality of temporarily staying in a house with many occupants hits hard.

An hour later, Lloyd slumped against the wall and pushed himself down the hallway toward the closet bedroom. Firebird really had been sick, and Lloyd had done his best to remove whatever ailments he could detect in the Altmer’s system which were causing the fever. Not wanting to be cruel, he even waited with a few of the other house members for twenty minutes after Firebird had fallen asleep just to be sure that a relapse didn’t occur. Once they were all satisfied that a more serious illness had been averted, Lloyd had spent a few minutes checking the other house members for possible contagion before clearing that specific bunk room as cleared of all possible threats.

By the time he’d finished and taken his leave, he felt like he was going to faint in the hallway. He was so tired that he nearly slipped in the hallway bathroom while washing his hands, and he took care opening up the door to the quarters in which he and Tammaeroth had thought themselves secured from interruption. Before desire could even bubble up inside of him at the thought of seeing her again, he heard a noise from inside which doused his inner fire with proverbial flames.

“Zzzzzzzz…”

After a few seconds of waiting and listening to be sure he wasn’t just hearing things, he sighed and lurched forward. Pressing his forehead and nose into the door, he surrendered to his disappointment and let it bond with his exhaustion. A part of him wondered if their rude awakening had been a dream, but when he opened the door, slipped inside, and silently closed the door behind him, he realized that he hadn’t been dreaming.

Sprawled out on her side of the bedding, Tammaeroth laid in the same position he’d left her in. Hair still splayed all over the pillow, she looked so peaceful as she snored at the ceiling that he knew he’d feel guilty waking her up, no matter how much he wanted to. Her arm was behind her neck, angling her body such that her back was slightly arched; every time she exhaled, he could see every minute detail of her body, a perfect anatomical specimen, heaving up and down. Most tantalizing of all, her other hand was still inside her panties, now down all the way to the knuckles like she’d tried her best to keep herself ready for his return. Both of her arms lay limp, though, like the rest of her, and he knew that their moment had definitely been missed.

“Think unsexy thoughts, think unsexy thoughts,” he whispered to himself while laying down next to her.

As images of his elementary school’s lunch lady floated through his mind, he tried to relax the muscles of his jaw and let his mind drift. They’d have only a few hours before they’d need to wake up and get back to work again.


	39. The Morning After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things only get weird if people let them get that way. But that doesn’t have to happen.

To Lloyd’s surprise, Tammaeroth had woken up before him for once. He vaguely remembered hearing her rise and sneaking out the door in the early hours of the morning, but he didn’t even have enough energy to roll over and check, much less engage in awkward conversation about their failed midnight attempt.

Eventually, the sounds of people leaving the kitchen down the hall woke him up. Still drowsy, he engaged in the routine of rising and preparing for work, only this time doing so alone. When he reached the kitchen, he realized that people were still eating breakfast and that he was awake relatively early given his lack of sleep. Tammaeroth was nowhere to be found, and he didn’t want to start the rumor mill by asking the house members about her, thus he spent the morning alone in the kitchen washing all the dishes by himself.

Like a few other times since their arrival at the Manor of Masques, he didn’t see her for most of the day due to their work. Firebird hadn’t entirely recovered, and Lloyd spent hours both before and after noon nursing the performer back to full health. He’d spent the interim periods cleaning up in the kitchen what items Tammaeroth hadn’t cleaned on the instances when she must’ve passed through there, assisting Alchemy with the house’s bookkeeping, and mending the sprained ankle of one of the horses of a local considered an influential ally of the House of Reveries. The day had been a busy one, and soon enough Lloyd found himself upstairs near dusk, looking out a hallway window toward the house of a local socialite who was hosting a small dinner on his patio for house members. As one of the domestic staff members for his stay there, Lloyd had assumed that he was to remain in the house in case of emergencies and as insurance against intruders or obsessed fans trying to sneak in.

Leaning forward with his elbow on the windowsill, he looked at the lights on the socialite’s patio created by lanterns and what appeared to be a grill for assorted food items. He had to admit that he was a bit jealous of the full members of the house who were there, dining and laughing loudly enough for him to hear despite the considerable distance. The sun began to hang low over the horizon, eventually disappearing behind the socialite’s house, and waiting for the stars to shine was all Lloyd could do to avoid falling into more melancholy worrying about where his life was headed.

Familiar footsteps entered the hall behind him, stopping short at the end of the corridor and causing his heart to flutter for reasons he didn’t fully understand. Tammeroth stood there for a while, ostensibly watching him, and he pretended not to notice. He’d been so busy all day that he hadn’t even been able to sort out in his mind what had happened between them last night, and her mere presence sent him into a spat of anxious wonderment which was more characteristic of her than him. When she began to approach him in a manner she may have thought to be stealthy, he found himself unable to calm down. He couldn’t remember feeling like that in his whole life, and he questioned his own reaction until she stood right next to him.

She hesitated awkwardly, and he noticed her staring at him in his peripheral vision. “Hey,” he said, not wanting to stress her out with a lack of response, and he noticed breathe deep as if she’d been holding her breath. He turned to face her and noticed that she was clasping her hands in front of herself like a security blanket. She was wearing a plain brown dress that matched his cheap blue robe in rustic style, if not color, and the two of them both looked the part of lower class housekeepers.

“Hey,” she replied after a few seconds, but she didn’t move from her spot.

He pointed out the window toward the house where the dinner was being hosted. She didn’t hesitate, joining him at the window without a word and resting one hand on the sill. “Did you know about that?” he asked.

Tugging at the fabric of her dress with her free hand, she turned her head to watch the house over yonder. “Yes. Alchemy told me about it. She told us to come.”

“Did she?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. “Wouldn’t that leave the house unattended?”

Tammaeroth shrugged. “I didn’t think about that.”

“Why didn’t you go?”

She shrugged again. “I couldn’t find you. I was busy most of the day.”

“That’s kind of you to wait; I’d assumed we’d have to stay here.” She didn’t answer, and he leaned to the side to face her, causing her to turn to see him again. “How was your day?” he asked.

Though she barely moved, her fingers played with the fabric of her dress nervously. “It, it was okay,” she replied with a false start, like he’d caught her off guard. “Busy, but okay. How was yours?”

“Busy too,” he replied, his heart beating rapidly again when he considered broaching the topic of the previous night. “I…hope I didn’t cause you to lose too much sleep last night,” he said, and she’d already started to fidget before he’d even finished his sentence.

“It’s…no…it’s…you…no. It was okay.” She stopped and cleared her throat despite not being congested. “I mean. It’s…it wasn’t a problem.”

In spite of being a little nervous himself, he decided that they could move past any confusion or anxiety over the previous night if they tried. He held his hand out, and she accepted it so fast that she did a double take upon realizing that she hadn’t even considered what he was doing.

“I’d like to go to that dinner, now that you’re here,” he said. “Would you like to go now?”

For a split second, she looked down at their hands and then at her own shoes. The hesitation passed, quickly, though and she exhaled into her mask while looking up at him again. He was sure she was smiling.

“I would,” she replied. “I’ve been waiting.”


	40. Party Crashers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First the party gets crashed at the right time; then, it gets crashed at the wrong time.

The pair arrived at the local house in question a few minutes later, gaining entry without question once the wood elf doorman saw their masks. In the courtyard of the sizeable home, the two of them found a portion of the house members - fewer of them than expected - along with no more than three or four locals. The party seemed like a private affair, which was for the better - Tammaeroth had been tapping her foot nervously at the door, unused to the prospect of being at a party with mortals who weren’t sworn to protect identities the way Alchemy was. There were no big introductions in front of strangers - they were simply admitted in, after which they took their time going from person to person greeting everyone.

Relatively early in the night, the two of them had been split up from one another among the guests. At first, Lloyd had kept a watchful eye on Tammaeroth as she mingled in case she were to be faced with any particularly nosy or scrutinizing partygoers. To his relief, there were no such people, and she handled herself just fine. Everybody had eaten, laughed, and drank - except for Lloyd and Tammaeroth, who’d pledged to support each other not to have any. Other than that, the two of them had fit right in, even if they were the two most poorly dressed people in attendance.

An hour and a half later, maybe more, Lloyd found himself on a bench within the branches of a willow tree, people watching as the other guests became subdued with the passing of the night and the inevitable drowsiness after dinner. He noted who was telling the best stories based on hand gestures, who was feeling inebriated based on body language, and who was trying to impress others by the direction they were facing. Without him noticing, Tammaeroth had sneaked around the back of the tree and sat down next to him on the bench, tapping him on the shoulder. She sat back with her hands behind her on the bench, far more comfortable and calm than he’d seen her in days.

“Having fun?” he asked.

She smiled beneath her mask. “I don’t think in those terms,” she replied coyly. “I’m not angry or searching for a target to destroy.”

“Tammy, are you enjoying yourself?” he chuckled.

Stubborn only for a split second, she nodded and hummed deep in her throat. The sound was calming even to him, and he remembered the way she’d looked so peaceful when in deep sleep; seeing her that way when awake felt contagious.

“I’m,” she replied per her usual quirkiness in speech. “I didn’t expect to.”

“I’m happy to see you happy.”

Her head bowed and she looked at her shoes, but she didn’t seem awkward this time. She turned her feet onto their sides, nudging blades of grass with the tip of her foot. If he were more presumptuous, he’d have thought she were being bashful, but he wasn’t sure. “I feel the same way,” she replied before falling silent - again, not awkwardly. She finally looked comfortable in her surroundings.

From the house, one of the servants - another wood elf - entered the courtyard with a curious box in his hands. Standing in one corner of a cobblestone deck, he opened the box and pulled out a violin while a few house members joined him. The short woodland man began to play a quiet, slow tune so soothing that the song almost melded into the ambient noise of the breeze, crackling fire, and scattered conversations. The two of them only watched a handful of other people starting to dance before Lloyd put his arm around Tammaeroth’s shoulder.

She did appear taken aback for a second, though not outright surprised; she immediately knew what he wanted. “What? Seriously?” she asked.

“Seriously. Come on, it will be nice.”

She shook her head without commitment. “No, I don’t know how,” she said weakly and unconvincingly.

“Neither do I. I’m terrible at it, but that doesn’t matter. Nobody here will care.”

Even when she stood up with him, she shook her head. “No,” she said while walking with him to the edge of the stone patio with him. She turned to face him when they stopped, letting her arms rise out to the sides and fall while laughing nervously.

“Think of it like cheating on a test. We can just do whatever those two are doing,” he said while nodding toward two house members they didn’t recognize.

“I have no idea how to do this!”

“Me neither, but I think it’s called slow dancing. See, like this.” He took one of her hands in his and wrapped the other around her waist, eliciting a little closed-mouthed squeak from her. She put her free hand on his shoulder, then the side of his arm, then his shoulder again. “You can put your hand wherever. We can even make up a new dance.”

“No,” she laughed deeply, shaking her head but putting her hand on his shoulder all the same. “Let’s just copy what they’re doing over there.”

The two of them tried their best, mimicking the moves of the other pair of masked partygoers as they went along. Initial shyness in front of the other dancers dissipated when they both realized that nobody was looking at them, leaving them to step on each other’s feet without issue. Both of them had poor rhythm, and they spent a few minutes just trying to synchronize their steps with each other.

Eventually, they fell into step with each other, by chance rather than any sudden aptitude, and they were no longer forced to crook their necks around to watch their feet. They were left only with each other, undisturbed and almost isolated. The slow dance suddenly felt very personal - almost as intimate as sleeping in a small room on the same bed. Tammaeroth began to breathe a little faster, as Lloyd was very aware of due to the movement of her body against his every time she exhaled slowly in an attempt to stay relaxed.

“This is like the night we met,” he said softly.

“What?” She paused for a moment and thought before remembering. “Under the stairs in that building? Ha ha…by Oblivion, I remember it now.”

“Don’t make eye contact and it wont be awkward…you said something like that, right?”

She laughed again. “Yes, like that.” Pausing, she stopped her eyes from darting around and gazed into his. “It’s not awkward anymore.”

The two of them continued on like that for a few steps. The look she gave him was probably the most honest, revealing expression he’d seen from her outside of long confessionals. The music seemed to disappear as they looked at each other and breathed, ignoring everything else around them. That same peace returned to her eyes.

“Tammy…where will you go? When all of this is done, I mean.”

She didn’t look away from him. “I don’t know. I haven’t felt stable enough to give it any thought; I just focused on finishing.”

“And now? We’re working together, and we have a decent plan.”

“We do,” she replied without hesitation. “I think we can do this, but I really haven’t given it any thought.” She dragged out the last word as if she had more to say. She made him wait a few steps though, truly enjoying their dance once they got started. “Where will you go, Lloyd? Once you’re through the portal and out of here, I doubt that eyeball thing will want much to do with you. You’ll be free to go. Being free seems pretty nice.”

She spoke without melancholy, though her last comment on freedom was so speculative that he felt a measure of sadness for her - and motivation for why he’d brought up the subject. “Hew’s Bane,” he replied.

“That’s a Redguard city…I think it’s a trade port, right?”

“You’re correct; imagine Stross M’kai without the pirates,” he replied. “I love Redguard architecture, and they’re close enough to Bretons politically that I could get along with the people there. They’re also not exactly united with the rest of Hammerfell, so Abah’s Landing is a place of minimal control. A place where people don’t judge.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“I mean, I know that anyone short of an outright criminal or necromancer is allowed to live there. Even a sorcerer, conjurer, whatever. Meaning, I could stay there without worry of being punished for what I do…or who I live with.”

She hesitated, gazing into his eyes while she considered what he was saying. “What do you…who would you live with? I thought you’d cut off with everybody you know.”

“With my family, yes. But if I found a sufficiently busy port, one with lots of weird characters coming through, I could associate with anyone I want to. Even someone not mortal.” She said nothing, causing his heart to flutter in anticipation of how she’d react. He was never one to play games, though, and he didn’t shy away from the topic. “Why not move in with me when all of this is done?”

Her eyes shot open wide. “Move in…on to your place? At Abah’s Watch? You mean…living together at your place?”

“Yeah, that’s the suggestion. I don’t have a place now, but enchanting would pull in more money there than here in Summerset; it’s not as common. I could get a modest place, and…well, the door will be open for you.”

She took a deep breath, more to control her pulse than to stall him. “Oh, Lloyd…I don’t know…”

“Hey, there’s no pressure at all,” he said swiftly. “I understand if that’s not something you’re comfortable with.”

“I didn’t say no,” she replied just as swiftly. “I’m not saying no. I’m saying ‘I don’t know,’ that’s all. I haven’t given it…I really don’t know what my situation will be once I have the insurance of Lord Mora’s oath.”

“There’s no rush to decide, Tammy; we haven’t even planned when we’re leaving Rellenthil yet. You need to make the best decision for you, as do I. I’m just putting the option there for you: if you want to come with me, then I’ll be ready, and you’d be free to change your mind any time. If you decide not to come, then there won’t be hard feelings. I’m only suggesting…a living arrangement which I think would make us both happy, if you choose it.”

Her hand squeezed onto his a little more tightly. “That’s difficult for me to visualize…I’ve been without a true home of my own for so long, I don’t even know what it feels like anymore. It’s hard for me to even conceive of…well, living in a place and feeling secure. Every time I get comfortable, like in this town now, my bad luck strikes again.”

“There’s no rush. It’s late, so we probably won’t leave town in the next few days. I’m just floating the idea out there…you can take your time thinking it over.”

She nodded but didn’t answer, only blinking at him a few times. Slowly, she bowed her head forward, breaking off his gaze while they danced. Her neck loosened until she’d moved her head parallel with his. Their ears brushed together as she leaned into him, resting against his head. Though he guessed that she’d been caught off guard by his offer, she melted into him calmly, slowing down her steps while enjoying his embrace.

For the longest time, the two of them danced, holding on to each other and letting the worries of the world take a break. She took another deep breath, like a long and contented sigh, and he would’ve fallen asleep from the serenity if he hadn’t been so aware of how her body felt when pressed against his.

She slowly pulled her head back and looked him in the eye once more. “Let’s go back to the house,” she whispered.

He cocked an eyebrow at her curiously. “What? But everyone’s out right now. The house is empty…” He paused and realized that she was giving him that look like a smart person who’d said something stupid. “Oh…oh! Right.”

“Right,” she chortled, somewhat bashfully again but without looking away. “Now, please.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice!” he whispered gleefully as if they were doing something wrong. She snorted into her mask, and he knew she was grinning wide. All was well, and they could finally be alone.

Until Alchemy hurried over to them, shaking both of their shoulders nervously. They turned to regard the vexed Altmer, who was panting heavily.

“The Thalmor are here!” Alchemy said in a state of near-panic. “There’s some officer named Druinald demanding to inspect the party!”


	41. Party Ditchers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back to short chapters covering a brief time span, similar to the start...an old friend has come to call.

Lloyd and Tammaeroth both looked at each other wide eyed. The little bubble of privacy they’d built during the dance popped, exposing them to the cold outside of it as well as the feeling of being watched. Fortunately, Alchemy didn’t leave them to linger for too long.

“They’re probably in the front door by now; the doorman won’t challenge any authorities. There’s a back door in the garden, right over here!”

Hearts pounding in tandem, the previously dancing pair looked over to the unlit corner of the courtyard where a gate handle was just barely visible beneath the untended vines. Tammaeroth immediately dashed for it, moving so violently that Alchemy raised her hands and stumbled out of the way. The Dremora didn’t let go of the Breton’s hand, dragging him along with her as the Altmer followed. Vines rustled quietly in the dark, but the sound felt deafening once a miasma of panic spread over them.

Squeezing through the gate, the three of them were in a small corridor between the high walls of two villas, all of it lined with uncut grass. Lloyd tugged on Tammaeroth’s hand, slowing her down for a second.

“Wait, we need a plan!”

“We’re leaving,” Tammaeroth whispered harshly.

“Tammy, wait; you really do need a plan!” Alchemy added.

With the two of them on either side of her, Tammaeroth relented, thankfully restraining her free hand against the high elf blocking her. “The plan is to get my equipment from the house!”

“Please, no violence; we can find another way!” Alchemy protested.

“Tammy, I think she’s right; a retreat may be the best strategic move we could make right now.”

Military terminology got through to the Dremora whose skull figuratively tended to thicken in a combat situation. Though Tammaeroth continued squeezing Lloyd’s hand until it hurt, she stopped crouching and straightened up a bit. “I can’t navigate my way out of here; I need you two to do it,” she said curtly.

Voices were raised in the courtyard behind them, and Alchemy shivered. “I can hold off the Thalmor with a convincing story; there’s no doubt about that. The two of you need to head south, past the amphitheater. There’s an oak tree out there, ten minutes by foot, behind a hill where no other trees are growing. You’ll know it because it looks out of place.”

“I already do know it,” Lloyd whispered.

“Excellent. Go there, and search for soft grass beneath the roots; there’s a dugout shelter which children used to play in. Stay until sunrise and don’t come out; I’ll find you both at that time with news and whatever provisions I can. Do not, under any circumstances, accept shelter from anybody here in town - I know how Thalmor dragnets work. Nobody here will stand up to them even if they initially think they can.”

The music inside of the courtyard stopped, and Alchemy swiftly ducked back inside without so much as a goodbye. The gate closed quietly, and Tammaeroth growled in irritation while looking both ways down the corridor.

“Where…Lloyd, I don’t know which way is south!” she hissed, frustrated by her race’s characteristic poor sense of direction.

“There!” he said while pointing, leading them down one end of the narrow space between villas.

The two of them hurried despite crouching, moving through the tall grass as it whipped by them. The street beyond the end of the villas was eerily empty.


	42. Spotted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Little by little, the pair try to sneak out of town. Unfortunately, neither of them are particularly stealthy.

The two of them slid into the grass at the very end of the villas, hiding just at the edge of the walls. In any other situation, they may have felt nostalgic for the night they’d met; like that night, though, there was only tension and stress.

Lloyd tried to stick his neck out to look further down the street, but Tammaeroth held him back. “You’re not supposed to be doing that,” she whispered at him harshly. She stuck her own head out and looked both ways. “There are more of those elf police on both side.”

Soundly rebuked, he hung back around the corner even when a voice in his head yelled for him to be the one pulling her back. He refrained, though, knowing that she had a job to do (and was better than him at staying alive anyway). “Both sides of the street?” he asked, to which she nodded. “Let’s try the north side of this corridor. It’s a longer route, but it might be empty.”

“Very well.”

The two of them turned and crept through the tall grass, passing the back door to the courtyard in which they’d previously been socializing. Bowing their heads down, they passed two more villas until they reached the end of the walls on the other side, leading them to a small stream. A bridge was just visible from their vantage point, but Tammaeroth blocked Lloyd from peeking around the corner again.

“Stop. Stay back,” she ordered while sticking her neck out again. He instinctively laid a hand on her shoulder, as if that would provide any protection, but she didn’t seem to notice. “We can sprint from here to the bridge; the water is bubbling enough to create some sound cover.” She held a hand up in the air. “We’re doing this. Get ready,” she whispered.

He breathed slowly to control his heart rate. Just as he was about the respond, she grabbed his hand and tugged until he crept forward to crouch next to her. He could see the whole bridge now, conspicuously unlit - the conjured light in the lamppost at one end had been dispelled. He couldn’t sense anyone hiding, though, and breathed a little easier.

“Now,” she said after she’d already stepped out from the corridor.

The two of them practically crawled down a grassy knoll toward the stream, sliding down the last few feet to the bank. Their shoes squished into the muddy surface when they passed beneath the bridge, and water soaked the trims of their clothing. Reeds and weeds under the bridge provided a measure of cover in addition to the darkness, and the two of them sullied their clothing at the last second before a sentry - previously unseen - walked down the bank on the other side of the bridge.

Like the night they’d met, Tammaeroth tried to cover Lloyd’s mouth, but he grabbed her hand this time, frustrated at the assumption that he’d make a noise. The two of them clung to each other among the reeds, holding their breath for much of the time while the sentry lit a torch. The fire illuminated the area but failed to reveal their hiding place among the strands of vegetation and muck. What it did reveal was the sour visage of a Thalmor officer scanning the area, taking his damn time and essentially wasting it when he just stared at the same darkness for too long. The elf eventually lost interest and left, walking out of view until the light of his torch disappeared. Unfortunately, the same bubbling water in the stream which provided audial cover for them also prevented them from hearing much beyond the area of the bridge.

“Is he gone?” Lloyd asked.

“Wait longer.”

“Another sentry could come along during that time,” he said.

“Wait.”

“Tammy, we can follow the creek east beyond the last houses in town. From there, we can cross the road and move south.”

“No.”

“Please, listen! This isn’t the time for the Yes-No thing!”

She growled and shook her head, displeased with the whole world at that moment. “There’s no good way out of this…can you bind my sword back to me?”

“I can try, but it will take a long time. Tammy…do you really want to attack them now? If there are multiple officers here, I don’t think it’s likely that we can just fight them all. We’re on their turf.” She continued shaking her head, frozen with indecision, so he opened an old wound in a desperation move. “Tammy…think back to the Deadlands. To your time as a nomad. How did you avoid enemy clans back then?”

To his relief, she didn’t take offense, too focused on their predicament to feel the sting of bad memories. “With my clan? By always having lookouts; there were hundreds of us. With the three survivors after we lost the others? We usually didn’t avoid enemies…we usually got caught and then ritually slaughtered in sacrifice to Dagon.” She looked down at the water and sighed. “Your idea sounds good. Point out where you want me to go.”

“There,” he said while motioning up the stream, past where they’d seen the sentry pass. “Even in the dark, we’ll be able to see the last houses once we’re out of town.”

She nodded and crept out of the mud, avoiding slipping or causing squelching noises. The two of them carefully stepped out from under the bridge, ducking low and focusing straight ahead on the route of the water.

The other sentry who’d been standing atop the bridge didn’t waste time like his fellow. “Halt!” the Thalmor officer yelled.


	43. Boxed in By Guards

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two of them take a few wrong turns while fleeing a rather effective group hunting them down. Backing oneself into a corner isn’t a smart choice when faced with overwhelming numbers.

On instinct, Tammaeroth grabbed a rock and spun around so violently that she almost hit Lloyd with it. He ducked and fell back, granting her the space to fling the stone object at the top of the bridge. The rock struck the Thalmor officer directly in his open mouth, loudly jarring his teeth and sending him backwards. He didn’t even have time to scream before he hit the ground, but the sound of the rock against his teeth alerted the first sentry who’d passed by. The light of a torch approached in the darkness, bobbing closer and closer as the first sentry ran to the bridge.

Tammaeroth grabbed Lloyd’s hand and began to run. The two of them stumbled in the mud at first, struggling to put more distance between themselves and the bridge in time. They didn’t get far down the stream before steel gleamed at them in the dark, and he cast a ward over them both in reaction. He hadn’t cast such a spell in over a week, and hadn’t expected to; thus, the cast was sloppy, weak, and consumed far more Magicka than it should have. The light blue color of the ward flickered on but was immediately broken when an arrow struck it.

“Archer!” he called out to the back of her head while she ran toward the source of the arrow.

She partially disappeared into the darkness over the embankment, thrashing around while a second arrow misfired into the night sky. The sounds of the scuffle were ended by the dull sound of an unconscious body hitting the dirt, and she soon returned with more mud stains on her dress, but thankfully no blood stains, a sign that she’d held to Alchemy’s plea at least partially.

“Tammy-“

“Which way!”

“Alright, let me…” His voice drifted off when he saw more torchlights gaining on them fast from the direction of the bridge. “Follow the stream to that tool shed!” he whispered while pointing to a little shack beneath a tree further outside Rellenthil town boundaries.

The two of them bolted, ignoring the corpse of the now dead archer they’d left behind them. More shouts reached their ears as sentries flocked to their location, gaining on them until they reached the tool shed. The structure laid in the shadow of a bottler’s workshop, and the road behind already had a handful of sentries idling about searching; their path to the stream was blocked. The pair dashed around the side and hid in the darkness behind the open doors. Panting, the two of them removed their masks while Tammaeroth rummaged around the shed.

Lloyd saw her reaching for sharp tools and watched the door nervously. “Fighting will only cause them to escalate,” he whispered.

“Fighting will keep you alive and my mission fulfilled; be realistic,” she hissed at him. From a rack of tools, she picked up a long shovel. “Tell me where we go next.”

“The stream is very close now, and the road we need to cross isn’t much further, but we need to find a way around those guards-“

He stopped talking when the sounds of footsteps drew too near to their location. She crept toward the door and pushed him back, and he had to fight all his instincts to let her stand in harm’s way. His entire upbringing would have pushed him to be the one in front to protect her, but she was better at that than him, and it was her job. Grinding his molar teeth, he waited for tension to mount until his heart beat uncomfortably. The silence was oppressive in the way it lulled them into a false sense of security.

Before either of them could react, a sentry jumped out from behind the other side of the door. A wooden club swung at them only to tumble to the ground when Tammaeroth smacked his temple with the flat side of the shovel.

“Ooohhh!” the sentry groaned while falling to the ground motionless.

At the same time, a second one leapt from the other side of the doorway, slamming a club onto Tammaeroth’s arm. She growled and struck the elf in the arm with the handle of her shovel, garnering a smothered whimper from her target. Lloyd punched the man hard enough to knock him out cold like his partner, and the second sentry hit the ground too. Even for that minuscule intrusion into the fight, Tammaeroth glared at Lloyd as if he’d strayed too closely to danger. There was no time for scolding, however.

More boots hit the ground outside the shed, and the two of them closed the door and locked the handles shut using the shovel’s shaft as a bar. Multiple people began banging on the doors, and a sense of futility descended over the trapped pair. Even Tammaeroth searched for weapons with less fervor, and Lloyd began thinking of desperation moves.

“I can try to shock them,” he suggested.

Her tactical sense was better than his, and she immediately shook her head. “The blast from lightning could set the wood of this shed on fire,” she replied while testing the weight of a gardening hoe.

On instinct, Lloyd began to trace the runes for a temporary locking enchantment, but the sentries were banging on it so hard that the doors wouldn’t hold still long enough for him to focus. He looked up to the ceiling.

“There’s an opening there. The roof is slanted, so they won’t see us escape on that side.”

“As soon as we drop off the roof, they’ll see us without a distraction,” she replied, the aggressive fire for battle gone in her voice.

He turned to see the dejected look on her face. A sense of dismay beyond what he’d witnessed in her previously settled in, much like a trapped fox at the end of a cruel hunt by pampered nobles. That passion for war and combat dwindled, and he wondered if the change he saw in her was the same one she experienced in the Deadlands when cornered by rival clans as she’d described to him. The look on her face and the slump in her shoulders pained him, and he couldn’t accept her next suggestion easily.

“There’s still a way,” she said flatly, ignoring the slamming on the door from a heavy blunt object.

He eyed her warily. “What?”

“You can…go up to the roof through the ceiling. Wait for me to open the door suddenly and let these guys fall through…they’ll be stunned and I can get the drop on them. Then you can jump off the roof.”

“Tammy, that’s too dangerous! There could be more people behind them. We hid in this shed instead of running so we could arm ourselves; there’s got to be a way to grab the equipment here and beat these guys back.”

She looked down and smiled without joy. Wood splintered at the hinges of one of the doors. “I know tactical ploys; leave that part to me. We won’t fight off police with gardening tools.”

“No, wait, you can climb up on the roof with me!”

“And then nobody will distract them for you to escape - which is the point of my mission. Which is the thing you told me you’d help me with.”

“We can help each other, come on! There’s no reason to just lose like this-“

“Will you truly do me the dishonor of breaking your promise to me?” she asked pointedly as the doors shook again.

A quiet moment to, stupidly long, passed between them as they stared at each other. Her joyless smile didn’t waver, though, and he realized that she wouldn’t budge. His nostrils began to flare, and he couldn’t control his expression anymore; he imagined that he looked as dismayed as she did.

“Lloyd…you know my situation. I must complete this mission. I don’t need to be present when you escape; you just need to get near of Shimmerene, straight west into the hills, to a little treeless embankment covered in toadstool. You’ll feel the energy of the portal there, and you can wait safely if I don’t meet you outside of this tree Alchemy mentioned by tomorrow morning.”

“But…we’re so close. There’s got to be a way. This hiding spot she mentioned, it’s suitable - you’re so close, there’s got to be a way we can both reach it.”

The doors slammed again, and the shaft of the shovel began to crack. More voices shouted from outside, at the two of them and at each other, as they prepared a short battering ram made of what sounded like oak. Tammaeroth was unmoved, however, figuratively and literally: she neither reacted to the imminent danger nor made any attempt to approach Lloyd. The distance between them felt vast, especially when she looked up in the eye.

“I’ll reach it…but I need to get rid of these people first,” she said with a drop in her voice that reminded him of the sound of a lie. “If I’m not at that tree Alchemy mentioned tomorrow morning, get to the portal. It’s under an embankment with toadstool, west of Shimmerene. Remember that. You can wait there safely because at that point, you’ll be too close to be stopped.”

The heat rose in his cheeks, and his fists pumped subconsciously. “I shouldn’t have led us into this shed,” he sighed, guilt stricken. “We’re cornered.”

“The way to the stream was blocked by more of them; they would’ve caught us out in the open, and my mission would’ve been a failure. Please, Lloyd…don’t let that happen now. Don’t condemn my clanless name forever. Even if I…” She paused and stopped making eye contact. “Even if I need to hide until the morning, leave this place and get to Shimmerene. Please. Please. I need this to be finished.”

The shovel cracked in the middle, still holding the doors shut but not for long. Tammaeroth put a crate in the center of the shed. “Go on, hurry. Don’t make this…hard. Climb out.”

She grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him over to the crate. Starved for contact, he found her touch too brief to savor, but too quick for him to keep his wits about him. He followed her instructions mindlessly, standing on the crate to open the trapdoor in the roof and climb out. She climbed up and closed it behind him, sparing not a single word. His heart beat fast enough to make him feel sick, and he climbed to the edge of the roof with trembling hands.

The door finally broke below, and he heard the sounds of an awful fight. Bodies hit the ground, gardening tools struck heads and bodies, and a few of the agents gathered at the door scrambled around and shouted some more. Lloyd leapt off the roof and hit the ground running, following the stream into the darkness, unseen and undetected.


	44. Running and Hiding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another short chapter to keep the narrative running (much like the characters). I’ve actually written far ahead, but I’m trying to pace myself.

Lloyd ran so fast that he felt like his chest cavity would explode. Beyond Rellenthil’s theatre, beyond the final crags and cliffs marking the town’s boundaries, beyond any visual signs of civilization, he found a series of rocky hills beyond the tree line. And then, he ran some more.

There was more than just police he was running from, though he was certainly running from them; he wasn’t exaggerating when he claimed to fear arrest more than he feared death. No, that wasn’t all he ran from.

He ran from another life he’d spoilt by his risky behavior. He ran from the decisions he’d made which had put him on a suspects list. He ran from the burden he’d put on an old friend who’d welcomed him in. He ran from the trouble he’d left with a new friend by fleeing.

Yet he still ran. Into the dark of night he ran, tripping over rocks and holes because he was too wary of being followed to cast a light spell. Minutes later - more than ten minutes, actually - he’d scratched himself up when crashing through wild bushes to find the oak tree Alchemy had instructed him to reach. Panting and bruised, he slid down the last hill to the lonely tree and crawled around in the dirt. On his hands and knees, he found the soft grass within an exposed portion of the root system and began to push. He eventually found a little trapdoor leading to a dugout area barely large enough to accommodate two adults. He climbed down inside and turned, sticking his head out and watching the first few yards of hills and mounds outside his hiding spot. Beyond that, there wasn’t enough starlight to see on such a cloudy night.

For a long time, he looked outside and waited. There weren’t even crickets or nixads in his location, and the windless night air laid still and silent. Had anyone approached within a mile, he would have heard them coming; he heard nothing.

He lied to himself for a while, imagining that Tammaeroth had broken past the group of Thalmor agents patrolling the town after surprising the town guards gathering outside the tool shed they’d hidden in. The last sounds he’d heard before fleeing were those of her beating the unsuspecting guards with a garden hoe after they’d fallen through the door, and he clung to that memory when pretending that she was only temporarily delayed. Feelings of regret and shame didn’t assault him immediately, rather circling around his psyche and closing in while his wishful thinking expired.

He still waited, staring out of the hole he’d climbed in to, watching and listening for any signs of life other than himself. He waited for a long time before sleep finally overtook him.


	45. More Goodbyes Than One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Consequences finally catch up with someone who’s made one too many poorly considered decisions.

Lloyd didn’t wake up until well into the morning. Had the police thought to send a search party to the area, they very well may have found him; he was saved by a lack of thoroughness on their part, not his own cunning. He woke up stiff and uncomfortable, and he spent the better part of the morning wondering how long he should wait without contact. He wouldn’t have known what to do had nobody come for him, though.

Eventually, he was found. Long before he saw who it was, he heard the sound of footsteps approaching. Bracing himself for the worst, he traced the runes for a temporary chameleon enchantment on the entrance to the dugout area beneath the roots; nobody would take a second glance at the area unless they were searching for it specifically. However, the footsteps he heard belonged to a person searching for him specifically.

She stopped walking. “Lloyd?” Alchemy called out softly.

Relieved and dismayed at the same time, he began to crawl out. “I’m here,” he replied while climbing back to the surface. The sunlight pricked at his skin, and he stretched his neck after rising from an uncomfortable position.

Alchemy was waiting for him alone, her arms full of more bags than she was used to carrying. He helped her set down what appeared to be two travel packs and a bedroll. “I don’t have the words to thank you; I won’t even try,” he said, “but I will apologize.”

“Don’t,” she replied, still breathing heavy and visibly winded. “I know you, and I had an idea of what possibilities awaited when I let you in that night. I have no regrets.”

Tension mounted in the back of his neck, urging him to ask for information on what had happened after his flight, but decorum prevented him from rushing. “Is the house going to be alright? Did the Thalmor accept your story?”

“Don’t worry about us; I’ve had contingency plans for that from your second day with us. The two of you apparently dropped your hopeful masks, but I found them before the guards were able to sweep the area. And nobody at the party will talk, not even the host; as far as that fellow is concerned, nobody associated with his party left for the duration of the Thalmor’s sweep of the town. You were never there.”

Lloyd looked down demurely. “I wouldn’t have forgiven myself if my imposition had hurt you.”

“Don’t call it an imposition…and, by the Eight, don’t make me say ‘don’t’ so much. The entire house knows what to do in cases like this. A few members whom you know personally have had warrants out for their arrest in their past lives, but they’re completely safe with us.”

“You’re very kind,” he replied softly. His eyes were downcast, and his weak attempt to perk up failed - especially in front of the mentor of an acting troupe.

Alchemy let her head dip lowly. “The Thalmor caught her,” the Altmer said, seeing right through Lloyd’s façade of composure.

Although the news felt like a knife in his chest, he contained his emotions. “I thought as much,” he sighed.

“I spoke to her,” Alchemy said, causing him to tilt his chin up. “They put her in a wagon with cages, next to a stray dog and a highway robber,” she said when he didn’t outwardly react. “The guards secured the area, but I was able to reach her by creeping through the bushes. We only had a few seconds…she told me to tell you to get to Shimmerene. Then she told me to tell you not to come after her, that you need to escape. I’m assuming that there’s safe passage off the island for you at Shimmerene.”

“Outside Shimmerene, nearby. How was…her demeanor? Was she okay?”

Alchemy looked at him like she were about to break bad yet necessary news, speaking sensitively yet firmly. “She was as one would expect from her kind: defiant and recalcitrant. They took her down with nets and billy clubs, so she wasn’t hurt too badly. You summoned who seemed of be a capable bodyguard, for the time she was with you.”

“She was,” he murmured, only increasing the sting when he voiced his concern out loud.

“I overheard the lead agent speaking…Druinald, his name was. They’re en route to the crucible right now.” Alchemy noticed the puzzled expression on Lloyd’s face and continued. “It’s where the Thalmor take two kinds of prisoners: heretics and revolutionaries. The latter are left there to be forgotten; the former are left there to be interrogated and yield intelligence. That includes summoned daedra, who they sometimes keep alive for a period to compel information out of them. It looks like an unused warehouse near the coast between here and Alindor. Nobody gets out of there.”

“I see,” he said flatly, working hard to control his tone of voice.

Hesitant, Alchemy eyed him warily before putting a hand on his shoulder. “Lloyd…we’ve been friends for a while now, and I’ve lived alongside you enough to breach the barrier of the personal. I know you were quite fond of your bodyguard…minion…however you defined your working relationship with Tammy. But you’re a conjurer…you, more than anyone, know the nature of such arrangements. She proved loyal, and so were you, but it’s time to walk away. The Thalmor are awful and disliked even by most of the locals here; you can’t fight people like them. If Tammy is correct in saying that you have a way out of this, then please…you have to run. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

Unable to say much while still moderating his demeanor, he spoke without thought or real consideration. “I suppose so.”

Surprising him, Alchemy actually put a hand on his shoulder; she was the opposite of touchy-feely, and his eyes perked up at the contact. He could see the concern in her eyes through the eyeholes of her mask. “Don’t suppose; know it to be true. And know that I find no joy in saying this. You’ve been a true friend, Lloyd, from the night we met after that performance. Understand that I’m telling you goodbye, now, and that’s extremely difficult to do.”

Snapped out of his stupor, he remembered that there was more than the capture of Tammaeroth to mourn. That was foremost on his mind, but he couldn’t forget the rest of the world - especially when Alchemy let sadness creep into her voice for only the second time since he’d known her. “Oh…you may not visit mainland Tamriel, then?” he said, half smiling in a sort of disheveled, haggard manner.

“I’m glad you accept the fact that that’s where you’re going. I have no plans to leave the house currently…maybe one day, maybe a day when our paths will cross again. But…” Alchemy paused, and he sensed that the dramatic stop wasn’t forced. “Well, I don’t know if that will happen. This may be the last time we ever see each other face-to-face.”

Casual and sly, she stuck a finger through the eyehole of her mask and pretended to scratch an itch on her nose. He felt the sense of loss as well, but his mood was already so low that he couldn’t feel much lower, and he managed to complete her idea without leaving her in a depressed silence.

“I can create a pseudonym. As soon as I’m stable on the mainland, you’ll receive word from me.”

His suggestion helped her to recover from the emotional sting, and she easily put on her optimistic voice. “Yes, that would be most judicious…authorities here aren’t above spying on people’s mail. Just reference the way we met in your first letter; that way I’ll know it’s you.” He was about to respond, but she still hadn’t moved on from her sadness yet and interrupted him with more immediate matters. “Here, this is what I was able to put together for you,” she said while moving the two travel bags next to him.

“I don’t have any way to repay-“

“Eight, don’t you dare talk about money now,” she chortled, most of the sadness gone from her voice. The two of them knelt down while she recounted everything inside. “There are two weeks of hard rations here, a few changes of traveler’s clothes, and enough gold to bribe your way onto a smuggler ship far from here if your passage near Shimmerene doesn’t work out. There’s a map, too - most people travel with itineraries, but I thought a map might be more helpful in case you need to leave the main road for a period. And then there’s this.”

She pulled a wad of fabric from one of the bags and held it up to him. Light brown and thick, it hummed with a very familiar enchantment that he could practically smell.

“This magic has my aura on it,” he murmured, temporarily broken from his blue mood.

“You taught me this one last year - that variant of the chameleon enchant. While you wear this, people will ignore you unless they already know your identity beneath the cloak. They’ll regard you as a beggar and avoid looking at you or talking to you. Here.” She helped him to put the cloak on over his clothes and pulled the hood over his head. “You can get to Shimmerene by foot in two days if you walk nonstop, but this might allow you to slow down. There are a few roadside inns outside city limits where you could safely stay without being recognized. I’m certain that in large cities, the Thalmor will send your description to local police.”

“I don’t plan on lingering anywhere…I’m sad to leave. I really thought I’d be able to stay here on Summerset, at least for a few years, but I won’t dawdle.”

“I’m glad and sad at the same time to hear that,” Alchemy said, laughing at their situation a bit. Her own sadness had left her voice, and she surprised him again by opening her arms out to him. “I never do this with people I’m not related to, but this is a special occasion.”

Lloyd felt a bit off put like she did; he leaned toward the touchy feely side, but he realized then that he’d never even shaken Alchemy’s hand in the six months or so that he’d known her. Direct contact wasn’t her habit, and their hug was stiff and unnatural at first. She held on, though, knowing that when they let go, it would be the last time they’d have the chance.

She patted him on the back. “Don’t waste time; don’t become sidetracked. I’ll be on the lookout for the postman,” she said as she let go.

“I know…I’ll get out of here as fast as I can. You’ll hear from me, don’t worry.”

The two of them stood, neither of them wanting to utter the word ‘goodbye.’ Alchemy remained firm once she’d recollected her thoughts, though, and she stepped away first. “I’ll return to the house, now; I should reach the front door within fifteen minutes. It may be best if you wait here for a while before leaving.”

“You’re right, you’re right. I’ll prepare myself and my route.”

Not leaving them to agonize over goodbyes, Alchemy took her leave, walking around the opposite side of the oak tree, at an angle from which he couldn’t see her. “Good luck, Lloyd,” she said, her substitute for an actual goodbye.

“Good luck to you, Alchemy.”

Numb at first, he didn’t even feel the sting of parting ways with a dear friend. She wasn’t his best friend, or even the closest one he’d made in Summerset, but she’d helped him more than almost any other. The brunt of their farewell, along with the brunt of the loss of another, remained too hazy to even register in his mind. The events of the past day, week, year all floated around his muddled head, and he had to sit down due to dizziness and blurry vision.


	46. Not So Fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Denial is the first stage.

Beneath the root system of that lonely oak tree, he busied himself emptying and reorganizing the travel packs Alchemy had given him. Everything was removed, unfolded and folded again, and placed back inside much in the same arrangement he’d found. He counted everything twice, creating any work for himself that he could to try to busy himself.

Pressure mounted in his neck, creeping up through his jaw and into the back of his eyes. He paused and bowed his head forward to stretch the tense muscles at the back of his neck, inhaling and exhaling slowly in a failed attempt to slow his heart rate. Crouching and folding his chin to his chest, he tried to wait out the heavy feeling in his chest, staring at the packages of hard rations and planning over and over again how he’d make them last across one, two, or even three weeks.

“This is fine,” he murmured, ignoring the growing tightness in his back and shoulders.

He took a swig from the wine skin in one of the bags and counted all the tiny gold coins for the third time. When that was finished, he counted the minutes until he was sure that he’d been alone for fifteen, twenty, then half an hour. When his mind became idle again, threatening his psyche with the full realization of the past day’s events, he tried counting the blades of grass near the entrance to the dugout hiding spot beneath the tree.

His nostrils began to flare and his teeth ground against one another on their own accord, but he continued to bow his head and count the minutes until a time he didn’t know himself. “This is fine,” he sighed.


	47. Grinding Teeth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You can only let it boil for so long before the steam needs to be released.

Lloyd walked eastward for the better part of a day. Although the main road wasn’t busy in Summerset at that time of year, and although he wouldn’t have been recognized anyway, he still stayed out of view of any other possible travelers. How ironic that, now that he was truly alone for the first time since leaving Stross M’kai, he began to isolate himself from other people even more.

Late in the evening, he found a covered glade far enough from the main road that he could no longer hear the noise of traveling merchants, but close enough such that he could just barely see the edges of the road from the treetops. Tired from running the night before, from having slept in the dirt beneath an oak tree, and from the physical stress of pretending that everything was okay, he retired to a perch he’d nestled into the tree branches just above a little pool of water. He didn’t even bother unfurling the bedroll, instead sleeping among the branches and wrapping the drab brown cloak around himself.

When the light breeze came and went, and all sounds other than his own uneven breathing had disappeared, he could no longer run from his own thoughts. Counting sheep could only preoccupy him for so long, especially when the sun was still setting and the dark of night hadn’t yet arrived in full.

He could still remember the look Tammaeroth’s eye when she told him that she’d reach the hiding spot beneath the oak tree. To say that he knew she was lying wouldn’t go far enough…nor to say that she knew he knew. No, the full reality was that he knew that she knew that he knew that she was lying. He nearly went cross eyed at the thought, yet the fact screamed at him in his mind. He’d left her knowing that she wouldn’t make it, and they’d both pretended that everything was fine.

He shut his eyes tightly. “This is fine,” he repeated under his breath while trying to sleep.

He wrapped his arms around himself under the cloak, hugging onto nothing as he balanced in the branches. His olfactory senses mocked him, tricking him into thinking that he could smell her hair again for a split second. He could almost imagine her phantom, like a celestial outline, deep asleep next to him while he spooned her.

The feeling was gone a second later. He suddenly felt very cold, and the silence of the glade which should have felt peaceful only reminded him that he was alone. The solitude he normally craved so much transformed into isolation; he spent a very long time grinding his molar teeth, drifting further and further away from slumber the more he tried to count those useless sheep.


	48. Broken Promise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dreams aren’t real, yet they exert very real control over many of our decisions.

Lights went up on the stage as the audience broke out into polite, meaningless applause. Faceless and without thought, the spectators were fused to their seats, every one of them a disturbing mannequin existing only to observe the absurdity on the stage. The curtain was pulled back, revealing a Thalmor officer wearing a gaudy green suit and walking with a pimp cane.

“Good evening everybody!” Druinald announced to the faceless spectators. “Are you ready for a daunting display of depravity?”

The half-bodied audience members all clapped on cue, filling the amphitheater with the sound of fingerless appendages slapping together.

Druinald walked to the center of the stage, standing next to a blocky shadow beyond the light of the torches lining the stage. “Then have I got a treat for you! Tonight, our special guest hails from a lake of fire in the armpit of the Aurbis, crawling up from the number one least popular tourist destination in the universe. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Tammaeroth!”

More hollow applause rang out from the inanimate audience as two Thalmor agents entered the stage from the sides. The pair walked back into the shadows, wheeling forward a large wooden object with a body on it. The wheels squeaked as a torture rack came into view, complete with a beautiful yet strong captive who didn’t match the scene. Dressed in prisoner’s rags, the daedric victim’s head lolled around as if she were inebriated beyond the point of coherence.

Holding his hands out to silence the audience, Druinald smiled darkly. “This poor creature was an easy catch! Quite often, our guests are already, shall we say, partially disassembled, but we were fortunate enough to happen upon an abandoned minion. For you see, her mortal charge, her only ally in the world, decided to toss her aside as soon as the going got tough, in colloquial terms. How lucky are we; how unlucky is she! For we present you this discarded demonic defender with no charge to defend.”

Members of the audience gasped and gawked, with a few of them even leaning forward in the chairs they were attached to. Like puppets, they watched every move of the two identical twin Thalmor agents who wheeled out a small tray full of surgical tools. Druinald didn’t react, behaving as if the implements of torment were entirely ordinary.

“To celebrate our good fortune, we’ll distribute the spoils of yesterday’s hunt as prize giveaways to our dear fans. That’s the value we at the crucible of cruelty promise for loyalty. Ladies?”

One of the two agents, indistinguishable from the other, brandished a butcher’s cleaver, twirling it around for the audience to see. “On the count of three, understand?” Druinald asked rhetorically. He then began counting along with the audience: “one, two, three!”

In a disgusting scene befitting only the horrors of Vaermina herself, the two Thalmor agents proceeded to separate Tammaeroth’s body parts like a lamb post-slaughter. Delirious and clearly in an altered state, she didn’t react as her whole person was terrifyingly disassembled. Pieces of her were apportioned and handed to faceless, hunched over contestants lining up at the stage and hurrying away with the abhorrently severed appendages as if they were trophies. To label the process as nightmarish would have been both trite and an unfair understatement.

When it was all said and done, nothing remained except for a single glowing animus. It floated on the torture rack, motionless and without twinkling. Druinald held out a silver platter upon which the two agents placed Tammaeroth’s bloodless vestige.

“And how could we forget the consolation prize for our equally discorporated contestant, the one and only Lloyd Rolsen of Glenumbra?”

In a long, sweeping motion, Druinald turned to point at an empty space in the dark void beyond the amphitheater. A wretched abyss, empty of all value and humanity, opened up in the void and by a mysterious means appeared even more bereft of purpose.

“But this is no token apology, no no! For we grant to our lovable loser the most valuable remainder of our special guest: her inner self! Sure, she can’t communicate with or even perceive the world around her, but at least this useless wisp of negative soul energy bears with it all of the tortured memories up to her most recent failure to find a home. It’s the memories that make life worth living, right?”

The darkness closed in around Druinald, causing the audience and most of the stage to cease existence. The wretched abyss fell into the void, drifting further away from the uncharacteristically enthusiastic Altmer. Druinald allowed the platter to tumble from his fingers, sending the only vestige of Tammaeroth’s being down into the sea of nothing. Druinald became only a distant image in the darkness, rapidly disappearing from the nightmare along with the rest of the universe save a tormenting sense of gravity pulling downward into the abyss.

“Cherish those memories, kind sir, because they’re all either of you really have left in your miserable lives!”

The world crumbled away, leaving only the sinking feeling deep in the accursed black hole. The sensation of falling increased in velocity until color exploded into the void, revealing the rapidly passing leaves and branches of a tree on a cloudless night.

Lloyd grunted as he woke up mid-fall, thrashing blindly and just barely stopping himself from slamming on uneven ground hard. His waving limbs caught ahold of lower branches of the bushes, and he narrowly avoided a fall in the middle of his slumber which would have grievously injured him. As it was, he escaped the night tremor with only a few scrapes and bruises, and a lot of disorientation while he figured out where he was, what year he was in, and why he was falling out of a tree.

Head spinning, he instinctively crawled against a rock and held a hand out to defend himself from imaginary assailants. The stillness of the water in the glade, however, reminded him of how alone he was. Safe but alone. The stars broke through the branches of the trees above, shining on the unmoving pool of water and providing a base amount of illumination. He spent a few moments catching his breath and reminding himself that it had all been a dream, though he couldn’t avail himself of the horrendous image of Tammaeroth being dismembered when sedated and defenseless on a torture rack. That picture, more than any nightmare he’d experienced in years, refused to part ways with him.

Wiping his eyes on his sleeve, he glanced around his makeshift camp. That lonely little glade contained nothing except for his belongings. Yet, despite his drowsiness and melancholy, he felt too disturbed by the images to just go to sleep again. His denial was a strong enough shield to prevent him from assessing his bad life decisions, his homelessness, his total lack of a support network of friends nearby, or his lurking apprehension about entering a portal through Oblivion unaccompanied, but that denial wasn’t strong enough to fend off thoughts about Tammaeroth being interrogated in a Thalmor prison full of villains.

Lloyd’s eyes fell upon one of his travel bags, and he reached for it without even thinking. Driven to the point of action devoid of intention, he rummaged in the dark until he felt the tin cylinder containing the map which Alchemy had given to him. Unfurling it for the first time, he looked it over and began to measure distances.

He was only a day away from Shimmerene…he’d previously thought that the journey would require a week, but Alchemy had corrected him in that. If he just powered through the trip, he’d be in a portal long before the same time tomorrow, and then…well, whichever realm of Oblivion he’d have to traverse in order to escape Summerset.

In the opposite direction, his finger traced a path back to Alindor; that trip would require more than three days, and only if he traveled without stopping. Just outside of the city, in the wilds to the southeast, laid a small structure labeled ‘cruc.’ in handwriting which didn’t belong to Alchemy. Crucible. In the time he’d need to reach there, Druinald could complete Tammaeroth’s interrogation and then discorporate her, adding even further futility to any plan other than simply fleeing to Shimmerene and leaving. Lloyd had no idea what the crucible really was or how one would gain access to it. There was no logical reason to turn back now.

But loyalty, to him, trumped logic.

“I’m sorry Tammy,” Lloyd whispered to no one as he began recounting his provisions for a change in plans. “I can’t keep my promise.”


	49. Seeking the Seeker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Big risks promise big payoff, but also threaten big failure. A certain sorcerer crosses a line of inter dimensional decorum, calling on a planar force of nature in hopes that he can offer what it seeks.

Lloyd hadn’t slept since his nightmare. All night and well into the morning, he committed himself to his latest plan - his unreliable trump card, his last ditch effort, and probably another bad life decision.

In spite of his hunger and lack of rest, he busied himself about the tiny glade, skipping breakfast and ignoring sunrise. His fervor caused him to ignore the hunger pangs and the weariness in his legs, and he didn’t even bother healing the scrapes and bruises he’d incurred in his fall from the trees. Stopping only to drink a bit of water from the little pond in the middle, he fully devoted himself to his cockamamie idea for a few hours.

Solitude once again brought the focus it once had, warding off the loneliness with his renewed sense of purpose. Though the glade was small, he’d needed a surprising amount of time to dig the spiral trough in the soil, pulling up shoots and stones in the process. Those very stones were used to mark the outward swirls of the spiral trench in a rhythmic pattern based on a single passage Lloyd had read in a former teacher’s library a decade ago, and he’d spent an inordinate amount of time rearranging them to be just right. In between the outer rows of the spiral, he carved arcane and profane symbols comprised of non-Euclidean geometry to complete the ritual spiral, all of it necessary for a simple spell which he didn’t know the exact incantation for. Hours after he’d begun, he stopped to look at his completed work, sipping one more bit of water from the pond at the center and source of the spiral. Logic dictated that he cease and desist immediately, but as with his promise-breaking during the night, logic didn’t factor in to his decision to go ahead and carve the inherently illogical runes defiant of the normal laws of physics and pure math. Even he gazed upon the eldritch fruits of his own labor with a measure of visceral disgust at the almost offensive contours of the otherworldly symbols and formulas, a measure he couldn’t articulate yet which existed deep in his Mundial soul.

After a few more moments of silence, he approached the edge of the pond. “Here goes nothing,” he sighed.

In a slow, baritone voice, Lloyd began chanting the infernal language he’d known only from blasphemous scriptures and ancient, pre-Mythic tomes stolen from the stars. Despite his lack of functional exposure to the inhuman croaks which formed the language, the effects were immediate. Despite the air being still outside of the glade, a light breeze began swirling within, following the same direction as the spiral. Leaves and debris kicked up in the air, following the same pattern as the wind began swirling even faster in lockstep with his chanting. Those pieces of debris achieved a zero sum state with existence at random, disappearing outside of the life-death cycle along with the stones he’d placed as ritual markers. The inanimate objects were fragile catalysts, rapidly dissipating as they were consumed by a spell barely weaving itself into reality, but Lloyd expended his entire pool of Magicka to stabilize it, channeling foul energies into the center of the spiral as quickly as he could to counterbalance the rapid deterioration of the ritual’s fundamental flow of power.

As if measuring itself to him, basing its completion on him sacrificing for its sake, the ritual lingered until he’d expended the entirety of his magical energy. Starved for Magicka to the point of phantom pain in his essence, Lloyd doubled over and winced, choking on the last few words of the incantation which practically dragged the last of his power from him like a careless, haphazard dentist yanking a wisdom tooth. He fell to his hands and knees, nearly falling further forward and hitting his head. Even his stamina felt tested, and he took deep breaths which echoed in the sudden silence. In mere moments, the wind had stopped blowing, all for the sake of a spell which would have been effortless had he properly acquired it. Lesson learned.

The first sound which reached his ears was that of a bubble popping. Not a bubble in a hearty stew or a child’s soap bubble, but rather, a thick, viscous substance not potable for consumption. Raising his head, Lloyd initially recoiled to see the noxious bubble rising from the pond which he’d been drinking from moments ago, but the alteration in its consistency reassured him that this was an entirely new substance. The water had turned black, glistening less than oil but more than anything consumable. The overwhelming odor of an inkwell surrounded him, a familiar smell to one of his profession but so powerful that he gagged and rejoice in having skipped breakfast. Bubbling like tar, the entire substance thickened like cold soup with a displeasing film collecting on top of it, congealing into a sort of hot, melted yogurt.

The entire pond twisted and swirled, spinning into a reduced state to reveal crumbled plant life and desiccated minnows. The noisome fluid balled up and trembled as it took shape, twisting into a blob which glared at him without the need for eyes.

Guilt, shame, and embarrassment infected Lloyd like an irrational lurking fear. Rising up and shaking off the invasive, foreign emotions, he faced down the source of offensive feelings with more than a little apprehension. A sort of dismissive condescension bore down on him so strongly that the strength abandoned his usually deep voice.

“I am Lloyd Rolsen of Glenumbra, sorcerer and seeker of knowledge, connoisseur of the forbidden, delirious of all which is eldritch and immemorial. And I beseech you for your counsel…Saei-Loa Nigh.”

Rumbling deep within the inky muck, whatever lurked inside filled the entire metaphysical space of the glade with its indignation. Never had Lloyd felt so judged.

Echoing in his brain, bypassing his eardrums and speaking directly into his mind, the response from the summoned demon promised only disappointment.

“No.”


	50. Arrested Consultation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our sorcerer reaches out to the spirits of Apocrypha directly, but his amateurish methods garner unwanted attention.

Residual ire due to the summoning ritual continued to radiate from the murky muck like fumes, pouring into the entire glade at such a volume that the morning temperature rose. The heat in Lloyd’s cheeks rose correspondingly with the swift rejection by the being which served as his final hope.

He straightened his back in an attempt to project false confidence in the presence of such an ornery entity from another dimension. “I am Lloyd Rolsen of Glenumbra, and I have called upon you to-“

The ground beneath his feet rumbled, yet he could feel that the vibrations stopped beyond his vicinity, forming an entirely localized quake. Before he could even brace himself for an aftershock, the telepathic voice communicated directly into his mind. “I know very well what you are, vertebrate,” the voice boomed in his mind so forcefully that he lost his breath for a few seconds.

Resentment at being summoned began to transform into anger, and despite the discomfort of interacting with an entity whose method of communication was so different, Lloyd pushed himself to respond promptly. “Then surely you know that many enemies stand between me and the mission you assigned-“

“I assigned you nothing!”

Hostility pressed into Lloyd’s cerebral cortex, pressing on his brain’s grey matter and making him go cross-eyed. The sheer power of the talking blob of ink possessed such a magnitude that Lloyd’s mortal senses began to malfunction. He frowned; this wasn’t the reception he’d expected. He’d thought he was an ally, or at least worthy of respect by the minions of Mora, given his protection at the ink entity’s orders.

Such wasn’t the case, however, and the entity used Lloyd’s disorientation to continue berating him. “A mission was assigned to a vertebrate other than you; your only function is to hear and obey! You’re not even a pawn like that fallen Dagonite; you’re merchandise to be moved and sorted.”

“If you view me as merchandise, then do I not present value?” he asked rhetorically. He felt a bit humiliated when lowering himself to the level of acknowledging the being’s disrespect, and he fully understood what Tammaeroth had meant when she told him that she’d felt embarrassed upon entering Apocrypha. He played the game, though, knowing that he had no options. “If you agree that I present some value to you, for whatever lofty reasons you have, then is it not judicious to heed my call-“

Lloyd was cut off again. “How dare you summon me, High Seeker Saei-Loa Nigh, Perfunctory Prelate of Apocrypha’s southwestern octosphere, to your mortal realm. Do you have any idea how valuable my time is? At this very moment, there are over six hundred beings across the planes whose thirst for knowledge is only quenched by my efforts.”

“And I’m one of them!”

The ground rumbled again, and this time, instead of experiencing physical symptoms of discomfort, Lloyd felt another wave of shame infecting his essence, like an unintended consequence of irritating the inky entity. “Do not presume to schedule on my behalf!” It boomed in his mind, causing his entire body to quiver and shake. “Your mortal brain lacks the capacity to understand the intricacies of our work! You’ve disrupted that work, brought me to your pathetic excuse for a dimensional plane, and wasted my precious time with your inane banter. Show proper deference and beg for me not to rescind your entire mission!” the telepathic line of communication echoed.

Lloyd’s skin broke out into goosebumps and a trickle of blood dropped from his left nostril, such was the mental strain of withstanding the artificial guilt assaulting his psyche. In his shock at how badly the conversation was going, he began to shake of his own accord. He’d expected a respectful discussion about his plea for help; instead, he was faced with a prickly opponent whose manner wasn’t far from that of the Thalmor who were chasing him.

He grew desperate, and in his desperation, he abandoned decorum in a blind attempt to elicit a different reaction, any other reaction than dismissive blame.

“Can I call you Saline?”

The muck blob squeaked, rippling all over its surface indignantly. The personal and unsolicited comment roiled the demon ink blot to the core of its liquid husk, making Lloyd jump nervously at the strong, visible reaction. The waves of ink swam and turned, bubbling and twisting until bulbous pustules pulsated beneath the surface. He’d clearly struck a nerve, or whatever Saei-Loa Nigh possessed analogous to nerve endings.

“What did you say?” it asked in a punctuated mental message.

Lloyd fought off a smile and rejoiced in the fact that he’d given such a powerful being pause. “Your name is difficult for me to pronounce. Saline is easier, it kind of sounds like your name in my language, and it relates to your watery form. I mean…if time is of the essence, that is. I do believe that my summoning ritual will hold you here for a little while longer, so we might as well skip formalities and get to the point.”

One of the pustules swelled to the point where Lloyd took a step back, bulging in an ugly manner until the surface wore thin. Popping with an unpleasant squish, the pustule revealed itself as a single green eyeball, staring at him with its eyelids arching angrily. As simple as a single eye was, it suddenly allowed the expression of emotion without words, adding a whole new level of depth to the conversation: the entity was upset.

“You,” it growled in his mind. “You insolent, presumptuous primate!”

“I can bring you the secrets of the Thalmor!”

“You…what?”

The bubbling waves on the surface of the blob slowed, swirling like a lightly stirred soup. The contrast was overwhelming: a moment ago, the ink being had displayed so much resentment that Lloyd had feared changing from a mission target to target practice. Now, the bubbling blob opened its eye wider in wonderment.

“I know of a secret jail for the Thalmor; one which isn’t known to people from the mainland. It contains secrets,” Lloyd said, somewhat disingenuously, but with enough conviction to maintain his composure.

“You lie,” it told him without conviction.

Breathing easier now that the hostility was fading, he pressed his advantage. “Surely you know about the crucible, Saline?” The being blinked in irritation at the new nickname, but it didn’t interrupt him. “You know, the secret Thalmor jail for political and religious prisoners?”

Stretching forward like a slug, a sort of head formed beneath the inky blob, with the eye on the lower right side. A piece of flesh poked out from beneath the lightless surface, implying that there was a body inside. The entity now known as Saline drew uncomfortably close to the Breton, staring at him with a second eye which popped out of the muck on the top of the head-like appendage. A scrutinizing curiosity enveloped him, lacking hostility but surging with so much more power than the earlier mental onslaught that Lloyd couldn’t resist the non-magical power; he felt as if every molecule of his body were being recorded and analyzed.

The being, Saline, quivered and roiled, moving its head appendage around Lloyd in a circle. “You tell the truth,” it said.

Lloyd recoiled in alarm. “You’re in my mind,” he murmured with a slight sense of shy disgust at the intrusion.

“Yes; I had to be sure. Tell me, chordate…what do you intend to do at this place, this crucible?”

Time for the lie; Lloyd braced himself. “Well, Tammaeroth already scouted ahead of me; I planned it this way so we could initiate a sound tactical assault on the Thalmor base-“

“A sound tactic coupled with an idiotic strategy,” Saline said, dismissive but not hostile, nor aware of Lloyd’s deception. The greater daedra clearly didn’t respect the Breton enough to check if he was capable of concocting such a fib, thus protecting Lloyd from exposure. “You may be intelligent for a mortal, but you’re still annoyingly stupid to a level which almost approaches that of your witless bodyguard. What can the two of you actually accomplish there?”

Lloyd grinned, delighted that he’d both sold the lie and secured support for aiding Tammaeroth’s escape. “The Thalmor only send the most sensitive of political and religious prisoners there; they’re also known for keeping meticulous records of everything. We can smuggle out numerous records if we have your support; we offer knowledge of the machinations of the opaque, totalitarian secret police of this miserable dominion. Our humble tribute to you, and our praise for the honor of preserving my knowledge seeking and Tammaeroth’s knowledge protecting!”

Giddy at the flattery, Saline bobbed and bubbled. More patches of flesh protruded from the surface of the ink, revealing the rubber tips of more appendages rubbing together like a scheming villain wearing a top hat. “Verily, I made the correct decision by electing to save you,” Saline growled, rumbling with barely constrained self-gratification. “Lord Mora will be pleased that an otherwise unremarkable ape such as yourself has proven so cooperative.”

Now that his nervousness had subsided, Lloyd retained the presence of mind to feel offended at all of the slurs, but he ate crow and ignored the casual insults. He’d almost gotten what he wanted. “Indeed; it seems that this partnership has mostly worked out. The only remaining detail is that of expediency. Tammaeroth valiantly scouted ahead in order to clear the path for me to the crucible,” he lied, “but she has a head start in travel time of three Nirn days. For the sake of obtaining this hidden knowledge, I humbly appeal for your assistance in reaching the crucible-“

A slimy tentacle jutted out from the ink blob, waving for him to pause. “You combine wisdom with folly,” Saline interrupted, “for you ignore the present for the future.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

Calm and unperturbed, Saline communicated without any real sense of urgency. “There are other details remaining, such as your amateur blunder of summoning me to your plane so obviously.”

The human’s eyes lit up. “Ah, but I already accounted for this issue! You see, the Coldharbour Compact only prevents Hermaeus Mora and his minions from actively intervening in Mundus; a sorcerer such as myself calls upon you at our own initiative, thus providing no infraction of the agreement with Sotha Sil-“

“Stop you simian simpleton, and cease the flapping of your orifice at once. You may be smarter than most of your phylum, but you still lack proper focus. I’m aware of the conditions of Lord Mora’s pact with the false clockwork god, more so than you are; you waste my time in your attempt to impress me with your minuscule factoids.”

“My apologies,” Lloyd said, again suppressing his own resentment.

“Unnecessary; what I require is that you listen to me and think clearly. Like the amateur which you are, you intruded into the planes of Oblivion to summon me, ignoring all propriety and subtlety. In doing so, you’ve left sympathetic ripples of your ritual throughout the sensitive magical fabric of the realms, leaving an obvious residual trail leading directly to your soul here. You now stand as a beacon for any beings actively tracking you down…such as those beings right outside of this glade.”

A shadow fell over Saline, causing Lloyd to stiffen up and gasp at the unexpected movement. He spun around and looked to the darkening sky, watching the flashes of light. What he thought was lightning rotated in a circle, revealing a cracked and dilapidated dark anchor. Functional in spite of its poor condition, it shook and sparked as a single chain formed of weak links struck the ground beyond the trees. Bodies of Molag Bal’s minions begin dropping down to ground zero.

“Oh poop,” Lloyd sighed in disbelief.


	51. Encircled by the Worm Cult

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So good news: I now have the whole story planned out to the 100th and final chapter. As of now, I’ve reached 84 chapters written ahead of time. This is the longest story I’ve ever written, and it stemmed from what was supposed to be like a 10 chapter short story, but I’m glad it’s evolved into the adventure it is.

Bodies continued dropping out of the dark anchor even when the gigantic chain began to screech and shake. “I thought that Molag Bal hadn’t fully recovered from his loss to the Vestige!” Lloyd exclaimed. He instinctively stepped closer to Saline, searching for more support than he’d actually receive.

Saline regarded the malfunctioning dark anchor with the same cold, distant curiosity with which it regarded everything else. “Bal was greatly weakened, perhaps irreparably, but his fanatical minions can still meddle in Mundial affairs to a limited degree.” Just as it finished its sentence, the chain snapped loudly, echoing across the plains beyond the glade. The rusty chain slithered back up to the anchor’s portal, swinging with enough force to topple buildings. The entire superstructure of the portal collapsed in on itself, prematurely ending the incursion into Nirn. The wind in the sky continued to broil in a magical storm which lingered over the wilderness, churning like a pot stirred too roughly. “Those who haven’t abandoned him in his time of weakness will be compelled to prove their relevance in an Aurbis which has moved on without them. Your previous escape has incensed them as much as it has the fanatics of the absentee god Stendarr.”

Chattering from beyond the glade replaced the dying sounds of the dissipating storm. Whatever had come through the portal was making haste to his position. “What should we do?” Lloyd asked, looking over at the pulsating blob sprouting more eyes by the minute.

Another tentacle protruded from the ink blob and waved Lloyd away. “There is no ‘we’ in such a situation; it was your impetuous, reckless summoning ritual which attracted them here. I am merely an observer here, interested in seeing whether or not Tammaeroth’s mission is salvaged from your impatience.”

“Now wait a minute, I thought you were interested in the secrets of the Thalmor! How can I fetch them for you if…”

Saline was gone. Lloyd jumped in shock and spun around, wondering exactly how fast the squishy blob could move before he realized that Saline had simply disappeared. Right at the moment when he needed help the most, he’d been abandoned far from civilization. Anxiety welled up inside of him as the hoots and hollers of daedric creatures surrounded him from all sides, echoing through the trees as they entrapped him.

Rushing to the closer of his two travel bags, Lloyd pulled out most of this supplies and scattered them in an attempt to find a weapon. The skinning knife which Alchemy had given him was all he could find, an improper instrument of self defense by any measure, but he wielded it as best he could. By the time he looked up, the minions of Molag Bal had already entered the glade. A motley contingent of ill repute ran towards him, full of hair and scales and leathery skin as an assortment of creatures formed a circle around him. Scamps, Banekin, a few Morphoids, even an Ogrim approached. The smaller daedra kept their distance when he swung around with the knife, hanging at a safe distance but still screeching taunts and insults at him all the same. Even the hideous Ogrim stopped short of engaging him, locking its knees and standing beyond its smaller compatriots while it laughed at him. Horns and tails and claws waved around in the air excitedly, distracting and disorienting their target until the vaguely humanoid leaders of the dozen-strong attack pack joined the others.

Three sentient figures stared him down from beyond the ring of less intelligent creatures. One of them was clearly mortal, another Altmer wearing the robes of a Molag Bal cultist. Before Lloyd could get a good look at the second humanoid, the third stepped forward and pulled back its hood to reveal ashen, nearly albino skin. Lloyd ceased his defensive swinging of the knife, at first frozen by disbelief and then by dread when the face of the ashy-white Dremora became all too familiar.

“Mr. Doom,” Lloyd said courteously in a sad attempt to talk his way out of the confrontation with the mage who’d led the kidnapping attempt on him when this whole mess had begun. “You kept your promise to see me again soon.”

The Dremora mage played along with the friendly act, even avoiding a sneer for a seemingly sincere smile. “I keep my promises, Mr. Rolsen. That includes both the promise made to you, and the promise made to my lord.”

“If that promise involves domination, then I know a few Thalmor agents who are just begging to have the chips knocked off of their mortal shoulders. I can even tell you where they are.”

Mr. Doom laughed warmly; the fact that the display didn’t seem fake made it even more unnerving. “Tempting, I must say. However, I must complete our initial quest, Mr. Rolsen. Priorities, priorities.”

The smaller daedra continued taunting him and making obscene gestures even when their group leader spoke with a nerve-racking politeness. Lloyd’s nerves were off balance, and he felt tension mount in his chest. Every time one of the Scamps dashed forward only to dash back when he readied his knife, playing a game of chicken with him, he felt his heart palpitate.

Steeling his jaw and standing up straight, he admitted to himself that the innocent act wouldn’t succeed. “I would assume that a top priority for you would be the avoidance of wasting time by throwing away so many minions,” Lloyd said, miraculously without any wavering in his voice. “It seems to have taken you a full week to reform your body since our last meeting.”

Matching Lloyd’s newfound candor in kind, Mr. Doom’s smile pulled taut and suddenly looked angry and false. “Thanks to my associate here,” the Dremora mage said while motioning to the Altmer cultist. “It’s amazing what a proper, professional summoning ritual can do to save one’s animus from the void. Given our numerical advantage…I think we’ll take our chances.”

“Why not take me yourself if you’re so confident?” Lloyd asked, gritting his teeth and bracing himself for a fight.

To his surprise, the Dremora mage didn’t take the bait for his proposed honorable duel. “We didn’t come here to fight; we came here to dominate.” From his belt pouch, Mr. Doom produced a black soul gem, holding it gently and waving it at Lloyd. “And we have no intention of doing this the easy way,” the infernal mage said.

With a wave of two fingers, Mr. Doom commanded the entire troupe of Scamps and Banekin. “Roast him,” the Dremora mage said.

Before Lloyd could react, the tiny daedra obeyed the command. All at once, nearly a dozen of the little creatures attacked with their magic. In a split second, Lloyd was overwhelmed, bombarded with fireballs and lightning bolts from all directions at such a volume that he couldn’t even be seen through all the smoke and dust.


	52. Predators Become Prey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When cornered, the fox will bite harder than the hound might expect.

Excited to the point of ecstasy, the Scamps and Banekin clapped and jumped as they all shot off their magic in unison. So overwhelming was their attack that Lloyd couldn’t even be seen through all the smoke plumes and heated light, save for a lumpy silhouette as he slumped to the ground. The lesser daedra all screeched in delight, braying in an unholy choir of damnation as they celebrated their success in an unfair, undignified fight. Even Mr. Doom smiled as he cast a soul trap spell, preparing to harvest a fresh soul to sacrifice.

As the daedra all rejoiced, smoke wafted up off of the ground. Grass burned while dust settled, and even the Altmer cultist gut laughed at the oppressive display of domination as a single target was obliterated by overwhelming odds.

Mr. Doom eventually stopped laughing, though, and looked down at the soul gem in his hand. “It’s empty,” he said, his voice tainted with confusion and disappointment.

Swift and soundless, the lumpy figure leapt up out of the smoke. Unharmed and uninhibited, Lloyd soared through the air, his entire essence glowing with power. Every single spell they’d thrown at him had been absorbed, replenishing his Magicka after he’d depleted it on his summoning ritual. Cutting off the twisted celebration short, he landed on the ground among the smaller daedra and swung. His knife connected with the head of a Scamp, swinging with such force that the ugly creature’s skull was broken open and its body was flung backward. Blood splattered all over its compatriots, sending all of the small daedra into a panic and shocking the Ogrim so much that it didn’t know what to do.

Fire and lightning spells flashed as Lloyd went on the offense, burning through his Magicka pool fast. “Impossible!” Mr. Doom gasped while the Breton proceeded to run amok among the Scamps and Banekin, stabbing them to death at will while they scattered from the flames and aftershocks cast by him rather than them.

Little bodies flew around as the daedra tried to rally and regroup, but their single attacker had gotten the drop on them. Any attempt to counterattack was met with skillfully cuts of the knife blade, leaving those Scamps and Banekin which didn’t die outright to die slowly of blood loss while they all fled with nasty knife wounds. In their clamor to hit and run, they covered Lloyd in dozens of scratches and cuts, but his nerve outmatched theirs manyfold, and soon enough he was covered in both his own blood and theirs as he swung the knife like a serial killer.

“Hey!” the Ogrim yelled as it gave chase. Its tubby belly jiggled as it gained momentum, barreling directly toward Lloyd with the magnitude of a boulder.

“I got him!” one of the Morphoid Daedra said while ripping Lloyd’s shirt, only to receive a swift kick to the knee.

Grabbing the red demon by the horns, Lloyd flung the Morphoid directly into the Ogrim’s path. The collision was painful to watch as they bumped heads with a sickening crack, sending the Morphoid to the ground stiff bodied and twitching like a squashed bug. The Ogrim lost its balance and fell to one knee, giving Lloyd enough time to intercept the second Morphoid when it lunged at him. The cloven-hoofed cretin raked its claw at the Breton, tearing open Lloyd’s shirt sleeve and opening three gashes across his forearm. Hissing in pain, Lloyd grew angry and stabbed it in the stomach, shoved it to the ground, and began to cast a drain health spell rapid-fire.

Mr. Doom and his two associates all facepalmed at the pitiful sight. What had begun as a ridiculously imbalanced fight ended up as a ridiculously one-sided ambush. Bleeding and injured Banekin scattered around the ground, avoiding the fat feet of the Ogrim while it regained its balance and began to chase Lloyd again. The Breton circle strafed in a manner which would have been humorous to an outside observer; all he had to do was run sideways and continue draining health from the Morphoids to heal his numerous open wounds, and there was precious little that the Ogrim could do. Upon passing by the only surviving Morphoid, Lloyd made the error of stabbing the red demon so hard in the base of its neck that the knife blade broke off of the handle, disarming him. Renewed in its fervor, the Ogrim sped up enough to approach within striking distance of the human and swung its fist.

At the last second, Lloyd cast a ward, throwing up the light blue barrier just in time to avoid being smashed. The Ogrim’s knuckles pounded on the ward like glass, shattering the magical barrier harmlessly. When Lloyd attempted to cast a shock spell, the Ogrim backhanded him away, knocking him silly and interrupting the spellcast. Another fist came flying, forcing Lloyd to cast a second ward. The third punch came too soon, connecting before a ward could be recast.

The haymaker from the Ogrim was easily one of the biggest shocks of Lloyd’s mortal life. The fat demon’s fist connecting with his rib cage wasn’t the most painful event of his life, but the sheer amount of force was just mentally shocking. Lifted up off the ground from both feet, Lloyd was knocked through the air about ten feet away, unable to breathe and panicking at the feeling of bones in his abdomen splintering. He coughed up blood in the air and then choked on it when he landed on the ground, slamming his heels down painfully and stumbling backward until he lost his balance. His desperate attempts to suck in air put him in a world of pain each time he inhaled, and he fell to one knee as the Ogrim had from the sheer punishing effort of trying to take in more air. Dizzy and injured to the point of nearly giving in, Lloyd clutched his torso with one hand and pushed on his own knee to stand up with the other. His blood coursed at lightning speed through his veins, pulsing disconcertingly fast as he nearly became delirious by the waves of crippling pain starting in his broken ribs and spreading to his entire body. Staggering on wobbly legs, he backpedaled to avoid falling down, spitting all of the blood out of his mouth and raising his free hand into a fist reflexively.

Except the end didn’t come. He looked up to see the Ogrim standing there, big mouth gaping in awe.

“What are you waiting for? Finish him!” Mr. Doom yelled angrily while recasting a soul trap on Lloyd.

The Ogrim stood enraptured, unable to attack. It shook its big, fat head at Mr. Doom. “Me hit, Nirnspawn die,” the Ogrim murmured in awe. “Always die; no can survive me hit. And this Nirnspawn live. And even stand up. And still want fight me!”

Lloyd was as confused as Mr. Doom, staring back at the Ogrim as it pointed to his balled up fist. There was no way Lloyd could fight anymore, yet it nodded at Lloyd as it closed in on him. “Respect,” the Ogrim said while thumping a fist on its chest. “Me sad me have smush you.”

Pursing its lips and nodding respectfully, the Ogrim seemed to show solidarity even when winding up another punch too quickly to give Lloyd a fair change to dodge. Thus, when his ward spell came up again, the Ogrim was as shocked as all of the others and woefully unprepared when its fist struck the barrier and missed the Breton.

“Doh!” the Ogrim grunted as Lloyd began draining its health with a powerful dual cast, backpedaling all the way.

Gross snap, crackle, and pop sounds groaned in both of their abdomens as their vitalities were reversed. Pumping as much of his energy into the spell as he could, Lloyd felt the pain of his ribs breaking all over again when they snapped back into place. The Ogrim doubled over and cried out when its own ribs shattered in reaction to its health being siphoned away. The layers of blubber around its belly proved too heavy to be supported by broken ribs, and the Ogrim stumbled off balance when its own body began to fail and collapse as the dark anchor had. By the time Lloyd had been completely healed, the Ogrim had suffered too many internal injuries from the drainage for its own abdomen to remain stable. Its internal organs were squeezed and torn, and its bulk folded in a disgusting manner as its own powerful body weight crushed it through gravity like a beached whale.

“Impossible!” Mr. Doom cried out when Lloyd charged at the three humanoids.

The Altmer cultist tried to intervene, but Lloyd tackled the elderly cloth-wearer so hard that his fellow mortal appeared to suffer a concussion. The cold steel of a sharp blade pierced the meat of Lloyd’s back when he tried to stand up, and he instinctively rolled away. Footsteps pattered in the grass as Mr. Doom gave chase, cutting another deep slice into the flesh of Lloyd’s shoulder when the Breton leapt to his feet. The Dremora possessed considerable skill with the steel dagger, wary of casting spells and just replenishing the Breton’s Magicka rather than causing any harm. Mr. Doom knew what he was doing, stabbing Lloyd full-on in the chest when the mortal turned around and trying to end the conflict with melee.

Aiming for the heart, Mr. Doom twisted the blade and tried to cut a deeper hole into Lloyd’s body. Unlike the Dremora, however, the Breton didn’t have the physical build of a spell caster, and using his uninjured arm and shoulder, Lloyd grabbed Mr. Doom by the wrist and twisted hard enough to dislocate the joint. Mr. Doom yelped pathetically and dropped the dagger, squirming in Lloyd’s grip when the Breton expended the rest of his Magicka draining more health. Mr. Doom punched Lloyd square in the jaw with his free hand, but again, the ashy Dremora had a mage’s physique and Lloyd shrugged off the blow.

Instead of hitting back, Lloyd pushed his opponent to the ground and picked up the dagger. “Die like your submissive lordling Bal,” Lloyd said while executing Mr. Doom with the dagger. Unlike previous instances of violence against people, Lloyd felt no guilt or nausea over ending Mr. Doom’s life (the demonic mage would just reform again anyway). Mr. Doom died in petulant rage, unaccepting of such a fate and shamed by the summary loss despite having held such an advantage.

Rolling off of the corpse, Lloyd knelt down in the grass and panted in deep, raw breaths like he’d run a marathon. Several of his injuries hadn’t yet been healed, and he had no more Magicka to use for spells. The Altmer cultist pumped out shallow breaths in the grass further in front of him, out cold and posing neither a threat nor a source of information. Residual pain in his very recently healed ribs as well as his open knife wounds from Mr. Doom suddenly stung him hard once his adrenaline rush wore off, reminding him that he wasn’t superhuman and still almost died. He could even feel his own pulse throbbing in every bleeding hole on his body.

He had almost died; the thought made Lloyd shudder. Too tired to feel the full trauma of having his life threatened by a circle of antagonistic creatures, he settled for abdominal pain each time he inhaled, and the frazzled nerves that came with running and fighting for one’s life. His fingers trembled weakly on the dagger hilt.

Two heavy footsteps reminded him of the third humanoid who’d been watching the whole time.

Steel boots stepped in front of him, between him and the corpse of the cultist. The final boss of his encounter waited for him to look up, mockingly granting him a few seconds to catch his breath while she tapped her foot. The impractical armor of a Dark Seducer greeted him with all of its unappealing isosceles angles, revealing the bottom half of a face sneering at him with the eyes concealed. The Seducer looked startlingly familiar…

Memories of the brawl in the Alinor sewers haunted him as much as her creepy grin did. “Nurana?” he murmured in terrifying recognition.

Her perfect pearly white teeth gleamed at him like those of a hungry wolf. “You’re all mine, now,” she purred.


	53. Human Sacrifice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A blast from the recent past has been waiting since the sewers in Alinor.

Lloyd’s ears were filled with the sound of his own breathing alongside his pulse racing in his head. On the tail end of an adrenaline rush, he felt his hands shake as he tried to grip the steel dagger in his hand. At first, he didn’t even rise from his knees, merely staring up at the Seducer who’d stood by and observed the impossible brawl take place.

Chains rattled as Nurana played with the flexible weapon in her hands like a pet snake. “I’m impressed, mortal,” she purred in her echoing cadence. Her fingers wrapped around a hook at one end of the chain, twirling it around so he’d see. “You just took a dozen of our companions by surprise and either fended them off or outright killed them.” She turned her head to the side and gazed aimlessly at the sky, laying the chains over her shoulders like a feather boa. “Most of your kind would have been ripped to shreds; the brave among you would have just killed a few Scamps and fled. You actually wiped our whole group. You have guts, I’ll give you that.”

At no point did her sneer diminish, nor did the gentle playfulness with which she stroked her barbed hook weapon bear any roughness to the motion. Outwardly, all she projected was calm irreverence. “In fact…I’ll give you your guts,” she offered politely while making an impolite gesture with the hook. “If you have any cookware in those little knapsacks of yours, I might even add some seasoning to your guts before I feed them to you.”

In a power play, she let the chain slip from both of her hands, holding her palms up in the air near her shoulders as the length fell to the ground. The iron hook thudded on the soil, demonstrating both her weapon’s reach as well as her cavalier attitude toward disembowelment. “Such a good, obedient boy you are!” she cooed while taking a few steps toward him. The iron hook dragged along the ground, rattling the chain as she walked. “I think I’m going to have fun with you-“

Lloyd lunged at her in mid-sentence. Not easily surprised, she held her hands out to intercept him when he charged and kept him at bay. Her passive aggressive sneer transformed into an outright scowl when her chains clanked loudly, however: she’d spent too much time describing her evil plan to him, and there wasn’t enough space between the two of them for her to swing the hook effectively. Especially when she was busy flinging Lloyd’s dagger away and pushing him off of her.

He grunted under the strain of his injuries and fatigue, twisting in her grip when she grabbed him by both wrists and held him away from her. Her strength was strange, for she was lighter than him, but she had the build and flexibility of a gymnast. In seconds, she’d stopped his charge and grabbed him by the throat, causing him to gag and struggle as his air was cut off. She growled, though, as her chain weapon wrapped uselessly around both of their legs during their scuffle.

When he wouldn’t stop struggling, she pushed him away and front kicked him in the chest. He fell far backwards and hit the grass hard, feeling pain soar through every cut and bruise he hadn’t healed earlier. His lungs stung raw and itchy with every breath, winded from the fight with all the minions, and his legs shook as he stumbled back to his feet. When Nurana’s hook slid by him in the grass, he dove for it. His stomach hit the ground roughly and knocked the wing out of him again, but he managed to grab the hook and hold on.

Nurana pulled on the chain so hard that he was dragged across the grass, but he wouldn’t let go. She tutted her tongue. “Darling, you’re not winning yourself any brownie points here,” she sighed. She walked over and crouched over him, grabbing the fabric of his torn shirt and pulling until he rolled over. Clutching the hook tightly against himself with both hands, he tried to scoot away and catch his breath, but she dropped her weight onto his hips to stop him.

The way she grinned at him gleefully, watching and waiting when she could have easily pulled a knife and ended him, caused him even more panic than the pain in his recently healed ribs caused by her squatting her weight on his midsection purposefully. She clearly knew how to hurt people, as much as she knew how to pull a power play, and she only grabbed the hook with a single hand like she didn’t feel the need to try that hard. Her teeth gleamed at him like a cat torturing a mouse before the kill.

“Come on, sweet thing…I can make this quick if you cooperate. All I need to usurp Mr. Doom’s place, within our ranks, is your soul! That’s not too much to ask from an old friend, is it?”

Nurana gave the hook a little tug, but he held on with fingers trembling after the crash which followed a severe adrenaline rush. Her lips parted as she tutted her tongue some more, shaking her head at him in disapproval. “So you won’t give in just like that, will you?” she asked with a feigned, passive aggressive tone of innocence. “I think you want it rough. Is that it, Rolsen-“

Once again cutting off her sentence, he bucked his hips up and tried to roll her off of him. Though caught off guard, she let go of the hook and planted both palms on the ground on either side of his head, bracing herself and keeping him pinned. Both of his hands now freed, he stabbed her hard in the abdomen with the hook, wedging the sharp end in between the leather strips and metal prongs of her body armor.

“Eeerrrrrnnnn!” Nurana groaned as the hook pierced her flesh and cut into her abdomen.

This time when Lloyd arched his back, he flung her right off of him like a bucking bronco. She hit the grass next to him and braced herself as gracefully as one could when stabbed, immediately pulling the hook out. Given her swift reactions, he had only a split second to act, and he rolled to his feet and began to flee.

“Raaaaa!” she yelled when the barbed hook exited her flesh. “I’LL TEAR YOUR PROSTATE OUT!”

Legs sore and lungs burning from the earlier fight, Lloyd ran for his life on the endorphins of a second wind. He fled directly to the tree line, exiting the glade and running among the trunks and branches. He heard the chain clinking behind him, but there was no way she could effectively swing it at him in the limited space of the wood. Running in a circle around the glade, he left her footsteps and angry cursing behind him as he forced her to chase him through the wooded area.

“You’ll get tired eventually, bloodsack!” she yelled hoarsely.

The stab wounds he’d suffered from Mr. Doom stung Lloyd even more at the realization that she was correct. He may have hurt her with the hook, but he was still hurt as well, plus he’d literally just fought off a dozen attackers and expended most of his stamina. In a desperation move, Lloyd broke out from the entire wooded area and ran into the flat plains outside, aiming for the hills beyond. His gamble, unfortunately for him, failed less than five minutes into his sprint.

In his peripheral vision, he caught a single glimpse of the trees maybe a quarter of a mile behind him. “What in Oblivion!” he gasped when she broke out from the woods and closed the entire distance between them.

Nurana was fast. Really fast. Lloyd had assumed that he could escape her since she was wearing a bit of armor, but she gained ground on him like a marathon runner. As fit as Lloyd was himself, he simply couldn’t outrun the unfairly swift demon who didn’t seem to care that she was bleeding and also expending every last bit of her energy to catch him.

Panting like a dehydrated dog, she finally overtook him with her miserable annoyance at a nadir. She tackled him hard in the lower back with perfect form, slamming her steel spaulder against his abdomen and sending pain through his kidneys. Gripping him around the waist in a perfect takedown, she brought him to the ground face down and caused both of them to skid a few feet further in the grass. Vegetation and dirt was kicked up from their impact, and they both lost a few dizzy seconds before she climbed on top of him and finally pulled out her knife. He rolled over to see her dirt-stained outline straddling him with an arm raised to the sky. A slight gleam of metal caught his eye and he instinctively held his forearm out parallel to hers. Their arms clashed, and her steel bracers struck his bare skin hard enough to immediately chip bone spurs off of his ulna within the flesh. Her arm blocked, she tried to press lower down to stab him in the sternum, edging the tip of the knife blade closer and closer to his skin.

Panic rose higher and higher within him as he found himself straining to hold the knife away. They both gripped the hilt with their free hands as well, pushing against one another for dominance. Though fatigued from chasing him for so long, she was in better condition than he was, and she’d barely broken into a sweat when the knife finally started to dip lower in spite of his resistance.

“You will not embarrass me!” Nurana hissed, though he had no idea what she was talking about.

Leaning her shoulders over his head, she pressed her hips down onto his barely healed ribs and pushed into the knife with all of her might. Lloyd lost his grip, and the blade finally plunged down.


	54. Demonic Intervention

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Success! I just finished writing chapter 100 of this story, which means it’s now finished. I’ll start posting a little more often now.

The knife plunged down, cutting into the flesh over Lloyd’s sternum. Everything happened so fast, yet he remained cognizant of every microsecond as the tip entered and sought his lifeblood. Images of his life flashing before his eyes were cut short, however, as was the stab wound. The wound was shallow and clean, and thus the pain wasn’t particularly severe so much as it scared him. Having a blade even a hair’s length into his body was frightening enough, and even when it lifted out without causing further harm, he still struggled and pushed against the demoness who’d been pinning him down.

Nurana‘s maniacal cackle was cut off by a gasp, though the position of the sun behind her back caused shadows to obscure her expression. A sort of darkness covered them both, obfuscating his vision, and all he could perceive was the fact that the knife had entered his chest but been pulled out at the last second. She thrashed around as much as he was despite sitting atop him, though soon, enough, she floated away without any discernible reason.

“Unhand me! You’re next, whoever you-“

Nurana‘s threat was cut short by…something. Darkness warped and twisted like plumes of smoke, but without dissipating as a gas would normally do. It surrounded and enveloped her, wrapping around her limbs and restraining her such that she could no longer effectively struggle. Her knees and shins left the ground, finally freeing Lloyd to crawl away and apply pressure to his stab wounds from the earlier fight, which were still bleeding. All of his attention was drawn away when Nurana began shrieking, though.

He looked up to see what had actually saved him: at the very last moment, at the very last second before she’d carved out his heart, her hands had been pulled back by tentacles.

Slimy, rubbery, and without bones, the appendages had wrapped around her hands and shoulders, lifting her up off the ground and leaving her legs to kick below. A jiggling mass floated above the ground in front of her, twisting and bubbling as ink splattered around and dripped off. What had earlier appeared to be a blob revealed itself as a pulsating mass of flesh roughly the size of a modest sofa. Eyeballs, claws, and more tentacles slapped around as all of the ink splashed in the grass below the floating atrocity. Lacking the radial symmetry of a Watcher and the lateral symmetry of a Yaghra, the bizarre tentacle horror which had stretched out its limbs to seize Lloyd’s tormentor seemed to be none other than a Seeker. Albeit a deformed and lumpy one, much fatter than the descriptions he’d read about them.

Absolutely frightened in a way that gave Lloyd a warm fuzzy feeling of retribution inside, Nurana tried to dig her heels into the grass and pull herself away. The demon which had been so confident and sadistic mere seconds prior had suddenly turned into a gibbering mess. Lloyd hadn’t detected a fear spell being cast, but the sight of the cephalopod monstrosity had the same effect on the Dark Seducer.

“That’s enough out of you both,” echoed the voice of Saline in their heads with a measure of amusement. “I believe this demonstration of entertainment value is sufficient.”

In disbelief and reeling from residual trauma at having nearly died a second time, Lloyd remained laying in the grass, clutching his stab wounds. “I thought you were only an observer?” he asked, though he immediately regretted the question - if he appeared ungrateful, then Saline might let go of Nurana as a punishment.

Thankfully, that wasn’t the case; the High Seeker didn’t seem bothered. “Indeed, that was my intention. Seeing you run in circles around a confused group of your fellow mammals was a welcome diversion from my studies.” One of Saline’s many eyes rotated to look back at him. “I have decided that I would prefer you not to die. You make me laugh.”

In any other circumstance, that particular insult would have been enough to finally push Lloyd to verbally strike back at the consistently condescending cuttlefish curmudgeon. Given his own miserable state, however, he just sat up and tried to apply more pressure to his stab wounds with the torn fabric of his shirt. “Thanks,” he mumbled.

“Your gratitude has been noted,” Saline echoed, once again missing Lloyd’s mild sarcasm due to its underestimation of mortals in general. “You performed well, while this purple thing here hid in the shadows like I revealed secrets. Secrets must be revealed; it seemed unfair to let this entire operation fail due to the expected treachery of Mazken.”

“Let me go! Let me go!” Nurana burst out frantically, clearly intimidated by the High Seeker.

Although Saline was clearly powerful, there wasn’t an obvious logical explanation for Nurana’s terror upon seeing the apocryphal demon. Either she had a phobia of tentacles, or there was something about Saline which Lloyd simply didn’t know. Whatever the case, Saline regarded the Dark Seducer with the same dismissive arrogance with which it had initially regarded Lloyd.

Dropping her to the ground, it still held on to her wrists with two tentacles, raising one of its four, flabby claws to stroke its facial tendrils like an old sage. “Let you go?” Saline asked before blubbering in a sound which sounded like an octopus laughing. “Be careful what you wish for, mammal.”

Terrified and desperate, Nurana twisted and turned in futility. “Lord Bal will destroy you for harming his minions!” she stammered without any strength in her voice.

Saline lacked eyebrows, but the skin above his many eyes arched curiously. Instead of a telepathic message, the High Seeker’s six nostrils rumbled and vibrated with an audible drone akin to the sound of a broken bagpipe. Nurana averted her eyes, scared to death and trying to cover her face. Lloyd finally realized that this wasn’t a phobia; Saline must have been kind of a big deal among daedra. He’d had no idea what exactly he was summoning when he’d carried out the ritual.

Leaning its lumpy head forward, Saline gripped Nurana’s helmet with a claw and pulled it off, revealing her dark violet eyes and hair for the first time. She looked much less threatening without the spiky helmet, resembling a sentient being with conscious thought and motivation rather than a vicious killing machine from hell. She leaned away from its gaze as if it would shoot lasers from its eyes or something.

“Is that a threat?”

The sentence echoed in both of their minds, and possibly the minds of any animals in the area. Bulging and jiggling like a person with a mouth laughing, Saline’s body moved like it was deriving more and more amusement every minute. Nurana didn’t bother answering, merely averting her eyes away from the High Seeker which must have possessed powers it was holding in reserve.

It turned back to Lloyd, reaching with a tentacle and lifting him up to his feet. Without question, the Breton stood up straight and ignored his aches and pains, not wanting to cross such a being after having summoned it without binding it.

“I will show your former master Molag Bal exactly how little he is regarded in the wake of his defeat,” Saline communicated in a voice which sounded raspy and aged in their minds. “Let’s see how given you are to the treachery of your species when your oath is bound to another.”

Saline then turned to look at Lloyd with a few of its eyes. “This will add value to your mission and my rest period from my duties. Knowledge for knowledge is a fascinating bargain…and I’d like to see how different pairings work out in the end. Alternate realities, if you will.”

Lloyd felt nervous again, this time at the cryptic message from the tentacle horror he’d summoned from the depths of a profane plane. “If you could explain what exactly that means in layman’s terms, perhaps I could - aaaccckkk!”

His sentence was cut off when the broken bagpipe sound began to play again, pumping out from Saline’s orifices. The droning sound filled his ears and infected his brain, and he felt an unwelcome, invasive presence gripping his mind and pulling it open. It wasn’t pain; it was just very, very intrusive in a way which the mortal hadn’t known existed.

At the same time as Lloyd, Nurana also began to gag and gurgle. Her eyes went crossed and she grabbed her nose, unused to the feeling of her mind being read without permission. “Yes, this will make for an interesting combination,” Saline said once it found a sizable pocket in Lloyd’s knowledge bank. “You’re quite well-versed in a few schools of magic…let’s extract your lightning spells as part of the union and see how well the two of you can rely on each other despite your mutual ire. I expect you both to grant me many more laughs.”

“Way,” Lloyd jabbered, attempting to say ‘wait’ before his brain felt tickled in a bizarre fashion. Memories of how to cast shock magic were pulled right out of his brain and transplanted into that of Nurana, who began convulsing in a failed attempt to reject the knowledge.

“Now for the best part,” Saline said while its tentacles slithered to both of their right hands. The slimy appendages coiled around so tightly that Lloyd thought his bones would break, and the suckers prevented his fingers from moving. “May your vestige be tied to this mortal’s soul, Nurana the Grakendo. May you be protected from summoning and binding from all other than him, never again shackled to another…and be it Aetherius or Oblivion, your animus will follow his soul to your own salvation or doom, whether his life is ended by your own hand or that of another…”

All of a sudden, Lloyd’s right ring finger began to burn. His nerve endings fired off pain sensors across his dendrites, concentrating an excruciating pain beyond what he’d ever known all in the small diameter around his finger. He yelled and fell to the ground, grabbing Saline’s tentacles and trying to pry them off. Nurana fell next to him and did much the same, hollering and kicking her heels into the grass as she writhed in agony along with him. The severity of the sensation was such that the rest of their bodies went numb, and even their vision blurred.

Saline let go of them both, leaving them both to roll around and groan a little more. Unassuming and possibly unaware of what pain felt like, it floated away from them and continued to communicate regardless of their coherence.

“Run along now…I believe that the thick-headed Dremora may have reached this secret location of yours already. Do not call on me personally again; as much as I enjoyed seeing this diversion directly, I must forego direct observation next time.” Saline reached out with a claw and poked Lloyd’s temple. “I left behind yet another gift in your cranium which I hope you’ll utilize for my entertainment…in your time of need, call on my clone. It’s less powerful than I, but when it returns to me, I’ll retain the memories of your foibles.”

Weakly pushing to his hands and knees, Lloyd ended up falling face down and rolling over again. His entire head felt like hands had been rummaging through it, and there was a strange hum within the lining of his skull that dissipated too slowly. “What…we…do?” was honestly the most coherent thing he could say at the time.

“I will return to my tower now; Lord Mora always requires careful bookkeeping of his collection. Just inform my clone if you need assistance obtaining these secrets of the high elves…I trust that you won’t fail with the addition of your new thrall.”

Dizzy and barely self-aware, Nurana arched her back and pulled her head up so fast that she appeared to pinch a nerve in her neck. “Thrall?!?!” she exclaimed in dismay.

Lloyd looked up as well, finding only Nurana next to him sweeping her head around so roughly that she fell back to the ground again. Both of them were dizzy and alone, Saline having disappeared again. There was nobody with them out on the plains, and all they could see over the horizon were the trees to the north and the hills to the south. Brain burning, he looked over at his former enemy with a measure of alarm until he realized what had happened. She did too, and he had to cover his ears to avoid hearing her primal scream.


	55. Agreement on Disagreement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mortal only recently acquainted with the ways of Oblivion actually has a conversation with a daedra sworn to Molag Bal. and one which doesn’t involve war cries and death groans.
> 
> It does involve profanity, though, so please accept my disclaimer. Nurana is particularly foul-mouthed.

For the next five minutes or so, Nurana rolled around in the grass and screamed into her cupped hands. Lloyd wasn’t entirely sure what Saline had done to them, and he gripped her knife defensively while trying to stop the bleeding from his stab wounds. The whole time, he watched Nurana scream until her voice gave out, leaving her to make a hissing noise from her throat as she worked out her rage at what he was pretty sure was a fail on her part. Saline had left them so fast that he couldn’t be entirely sure.

Eventually, Lloyd realized that he wouldn’t be able to stop the bleeding using only his hand and torn fabric from his shirt; he needed to return to the glade for the sewing needle Alchemy had packed for him. By the time of that realization, Nurana had worn herself out from rolling around and screaming, rising to her knees and breathing heavily while she looked around in a fugue state.

Her eyes met Lloyd’s as she scanned the area, passing him over before her head snapped back to him. “You!” she growled through her teeth. He held her knife in front of him, making a show of his defensive posture, though neither of them were in any shape for a fight. “A pox on you and everyone you’ve ever known! May you die a thousand deaths and then die some more!”

Unsure of what exactly Saline had done, Lloyd said nothing and just watched her movements. He noticed her eyes flit down to his trembling fingers, barely able to hold her knife. Flexing her fingers in a predatory fashion, she almost looked ready to pounce. “This is all your fault!” she hissed as electricity crackled between her knuckles, an ability he hadn’t seen from her previously.

The same shock magic which he had been casting for years arced out of her fingertips, jolting him with lightning for only half a second before he regained his wits and absorbed the spell. His Magicka returning to him at her expense, he instinctively began to drain her health as well, healing most of his remaining cuts and stab wounds though leaving his bruises and removing only some of the pain in his ribs. Her skin glowed beneath the surface as her life force was siphoned out of her, and she ceased her attack. The combined burden of his counterattack and Saline’s disorienting intrusion stung her enough, and she held her hands up despite appearing able to have continued fighting.

“I yield, I yield, I yield, you idiot!” she gasped, not incapacitated so much as aware that she’d surrendered her advantage to him by attacking him with a magical spell. “No more!”

Ingrained experience as a law enforcer sprang into Lloyd’s mind, and he found himself ceasing his own attack on a yielding foe in spite of the more paranoid voice in his head demanding that he either continue casting or run away again. A little braver once he wasn’t injured anymore, he gripped her knife more tightly. “What’s going on? How are you casting my magic?” he asked, not considering the appropriacy of his question.

Recalcitrant despite her surrender, she looked up at him with barely masked hatred. “Dank daedroth’s breath, are you truly that stupid that you can’t understand what that octoscum said? Or are you deaf in addition to dumb?” she so articulately wove with her words.

For a moment, Lloyd wondered why he didn’t continue draining and try to kill her right there, but the hazy memory of Saline’s curse granted him pause. That, and the worrying amnesia he felt when trying to comprehend how she’d cast a shock spell. “It…bound you to me? Forcibly?” he wondered out loud. “But my thoughts…my magic…it ripped out some of my destruction spells and gave those to you?”

Nurana grit her teeth at him, growing more angry by the minute. “Holy shit, you seriously needed this long to figure it out? How the hell are you a sorcerer, you dumbass? You couldn’t even finish a Nibenese crossword puzzle.”

Despite her fury, he loosened his grip on her knife, curious rather than worried. “I’ve lost my lightning spells…but you still have them? But…wait, why didn’t it just bind you to me without the need for me to give up knowledge?”

“You’re massively stupid. Oblivion, why! Why did I end up with this dumb fuck of all people!” Nurana growled up at the sky, storm winds now gone. “Of all the mortals I could meet my end with, why this piece of dog shit!”

“Hey, calm down. This means we aren’t fighting against each other, like a normal summoning,” he asked, his spirits picking up when he realized that she might not try to murder him again. “Right?”

“Wrong, you frost giant’s dingleberry. Every word falling out of your ignorant mortal mouth represents a primitive idiocy unbecoming of even the Vermai. Your very existence is an insult-“

“Nurana, are you able to kill me right now?” he interrupted.

Snarling like an irritated guard dog, she looked positively feral when being forced to admit inconvenient truths. “I swear on all that’s unholy, if that squidfaced motherfucker ever removes this curse for a minute, for a second, I’ll murder you and all whom you love. I’ll slit your throat while you’re sleeping and leaving me on watch.”

He ignored her threats and slurs. “And as for now? Right now? Can you kill me?” he asked pointedly.

Scowling and frowning, she appeared to be fighting against a primal urge within her body. His sixth sense for magical effects tickled him, and he could feel the familiar yet distant sensation of a bound familiar pulling in his metaphysical leash, subtly resisting an authority she couldn’t openly defy. Her facial muscles almost began to spasm like she were fighting her own body, but she swiftly gave in.

“No,” she practically gagged, resisting the utterance. “You bastard, you slimy son of a bitch, I can’t. This is more than binding, you inbred cur. My vestige is bound to your soul. Your soul!”

She rose to her feet, causing him to tense up again. He watched both of her hands as she approached and raised them in a rude gesture, but she seemed to be emoting rather than launching a sneak attack. “Don’t you understand what that means, you heartless shithead? Do you understand what you’ve done to me?”

“I did nothing,” he said while taking a step back, though she continued following him. “Saline did this; I was only protecting myself. Your side drew first blood.”

“You, yes you, you protecting yourself, you self-absorbed pondscum on the shore of your wretched realm’s primordial soup! This is aaaaaaaaaallll about you, so you can maintain your little lie of goodness and morality, ignoring your own disgusting, two-faced evil!”

He held his hands out defensively, keeping them back up when she slapped them away. “I said calm down. You were on the side of Molag Bal; you’re on my side now. What’s your problem?”

“You! You! You are my problem you unbelievable, self-centered asshole!” she screamed loudly enough for him to glance around instinctively, though there was nobody to hear them. She continued approaching and forcing him to back away. “I’m tied to your soul! In life and in death! Don’t you understand, you stupid dumbshit godsdamned motherfucker?” she screamed viciously enough to accidentally spit everywhere, wide-eyed and rabid.

“Calm down or I’ll drop you,” he warned, more from fear than firmness.

She jabbed a finger into his chest, poking at him so violently that her movement was almost comical. “You! You’re supposed to understand this you blonde ape! When mortals die, your souls go to Aetherius; our vestiges can permanently die in Aetherius! Permanently! Forever!”

Nurana threw her hands up in the air, screaming at him like a fundamentalist preacher at the pulpit. “I’m a demon, I’m not supposed to die you fucking monster!” she screamed, not realizing how ironic and contradictory her sentence sounded to his mortal ears. “Everything I know, everything I believed, everything I was promised was based on not dying permanently! Death is temporary, it’s not in my mind, and you RUINED EVERYTHING!” She jabbed him on the chest again, and he finally reacted and grabbed her by the wrist. Instead of granting him space, she stuck her face right in front of his and yelled from just a few inches away, scaring him with her rage and voice alone. “You, Lloyd Rolsen! You condemned me to the darkness, to non-existence, to death without an afterlife! You destroyed everything, you took everything away from me in one fucking moment! You heartless, callous, hypocritical kernel of pigshit, you ended my whole world!”

Her voice broke as she became emotional, displaying feelings he hadn’t expected a bloodthirsty demon like her to truly possess. “You killed me, you and that octopus thing! No matter what I planned on doing to you, it’s not anywhere close as bad as what you’ve done to me!” she screamed, though the power was gone from her voice. “I hate you, Rolsen, I hate you more than anything in this damned universe! You ended my universe! **You’re going to end me!** ”

The word ‘me’ echoed across the hills, a punctuation mark since her voice finally gave out on her from all the yelling. She looked absolutely insane, nostrils flaring and eyes open to widely that her eyelids must have hurt. Her molar teeth ground together with such force that he could hear it, and her jaw audibly clicked. She even grabbed him by what remained of his torn shirt’s collar, unable to hurt him but trying to register her fury any way she could.

He took a deep breath. For a long time, he hadn’t practiced his conflict mediation skills, and now seemed as good a time as ever. Counting his own pulse to calm down, he slowly took her by the wrist, removed her hand, and pushed her away to create a measure of space between them.

“I know that you’re angry, and I can understand why.”

“Fuck you,” she huffed in a hoarse voice.

“But I also know that you killed several city guards in Alinor to get to me - people who, even if they wanted to arrest me, still had families who’ve now lost them. I know that you intend to cause me both bodily and spiritual harm, and that you tried to murder Tammaeroth, which would have been painful and traumatic for her even if not permanent. To top it all off, you’re willingly dedicated to a daedric prince known as the King of Rape, a title which really requires no further explanation as to why I don’t feel sorry for you.”

Her jaw dropped and she gasped, morally outraged, but he didn’t give her a chance to reply. “Yes, I don’t sympathize with you, Nurana. I’m sure that the knowledge of permanent death is terrifying for an immortal being, but you’ve used your immortality to murder mortal people who know nothing except for permanent death. That’s only this time; I have no way of knowing how long you’ve been tormenting the people of Nirn for.” She stammered and stuttered, enraged beyond words, but he waved his hand for her to remain quiet. “You’ve earned no remorse from me, nor any pity. You’re a demon, as you said, but not a penitent one. When my time comes to pass over to the other side, whether from old age or on some quest, you’ll taste the recompense for all the people you’ve hurt - back in Alinor and any other time in your life.”

Suddenly relaxed and no longer fearing for his life, he tapped into his remaining Magicka to prepare a healing spell as he walked away. “Follow me and stop yelling. I’m going to heal that hook wound on your stomach, and we’re going back to see if we can still catch that cultist you showed up with. I need to know if I’m still being followed when we go to meet Tammaeroth outside of Alinor.”

He stopped and turned back to her, watching her teeth grind and the puncture on her abdomen bleed while she hesitated. Her resistance tugged on his soul as her anger seethed, but she eventually followed when she noticed his healing spell. Though she didn’t yell, she cussed at him every step of the way back to the glade.


	56. Partially Successful Interrogation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few answers are gleaned from a survivor. At the same time, the daedra adapts to being bossed around by a mortal.

Not one for stealth, Lloyd led the way back to the glade and through the trees without watching his footsteps. Nurana continued hurling every dirty word in the dictionary at him while they walked, ceasing only for a minute or so when he’d healed her. By the time the two of them entered the glade, there was already a body moving around among the fallen. Lloyd hurried for the last few steps, leaping over the underbrush to reveal himself.

Corpses of daedra littered the ground, crumbling and oozing at a much faster rate than a mortal corpse would. A figure in black robes hobbled away as soon as the Breton made himself known.

“That cultist has my stuff!” Lloyd yelled while pointing at the aged Altmer. Immediately falling into the old habit of minion and master, he leaned to Nurana without even thinking of her outright hostility toward him. “Go get that guy!” Lloyd ordered, earning only a ‘psht’ from the Dark Seducer at first. “I’m serious, go get him and bring him back alive. Now.”

He gave her a little push, earning him another four-letter word while she hesitated. Confident in her binding, he even gave her her knife back.

“Dipshit,” she spat at him, though in the end, she did as she was told.

For a few seconds, he watched to be sure that she would truly follow his orders. To his relief, she did just that, chasing the cultist down at an astounding rate. She got the drop on the grey-haired high elf, electrocuting and then beating up the cultist a little before dragging him back across the grass. Lloyd took the time to gather up what little the cultist hadn’t tried to steal from the clearing, carefully repacking his travel bags and sorting his belongings. He was still changing into a fresh set of clothes when Nurana reached him in the glade.

The elderly Aldmeri didn’t even struggle as Nurana dragged him by the ankles over the grass. “Beware!” the blasphemous cultist yelled. “Beware the vengeance of the Lord of Schemes!”

Lloyd didn’t even bother looking at the cultist while he changed. “Take anything of value this miscreant has,” he ordered. Nurana grumbled, but she did hand him a belt pouch containing a few dozen gold coins and a soul gem, which he stored alongside the soul gem Mr. Doom had brought. Until that point, the cultist has remained on the ground. “Stand him up.”

Compliant to a surprising degree, Nurana grabbed the cultist and pulled him into a standing position, though she also mouthed another dirty word at Lloyd in the process. The cultist didn’t notice, and gave her a dismissive glance. “May Lord Bal forsake you for your treason,” the Altmer spat defiantly.

“You have no idea what’s going on!” she started to explain, though Lloyd interrupted to prevent her from showing any discord.

“Tell me why you’re after me, or I’ll let her do whatever she wants to you,” Lloyd said in an even voice.

“A curse on the womb which bore you!”

Without any escalation or even conscious intention, Lloyd punched the Altmer hard enough on the nose to break the cartilage, but soft enough not to knock the cultist out cold again. The aging dark priest cried out and buckled over, covering his face with blood tricking out over his fingers. Nurana pressed her lips into a line and examined Lloyd closely.

After an inordinate amount of work to control his breathing and facial expression, Lloyd rationalized his anger as much as he could under time pressure. “Let’s try this again, and you thank your lucky stars that I administered that punishment myself,” he said, ignoring Nurana’s unflinching stare. “Why has a cult dedicated to Molag Bal been stalking me?”

Sniffing and gagging, the cultist sneered angrily but became much more compliant after having his nose broken. “Blood for the blood god!” the cultist repeated like a truly brainwashed zombie. “Souls to restore Lord Bal to his greatness!”

“Sounds like what was happening during the Planemeld,” Lloyd surmised out loud. “But why me? Why now? Why here?”

As Lloyd was getting used to receiving, the cultist looked at him like he were a smart person saying something stupid. “Because it’s you, and it’s now, and it’s here! Don’t you see how clever our scheme is?” The cultist’s voice rose in pitch, projecting a sermon at the unannointed. “You, a drifter with no home, no connections save the distant, impersonal environment of the Mage’s Guild! You have no family here, no real friends, no prestige, no influence in the community! Everyone was so focused on the Triad and the Court of Bedlam, they’ve forgotten the supreme savior!”

Lloyd folded his arms behind his back and paced in front of the cultist, eyes downward as he pondered the convenient explanation. “There must be many wanderers on this island now that immigration has been legalized. What put me higher on the list?”

Reveling in the opportunity to brag about an evil plan, the cultist grinned wide. Blood dropped down his nose to his upper lip and around both sides of his mouth, making him look as crazy as Nurana had. “You think you’re the only one? Ha! I’ll have you know that we’ve abducted four others this year as sacrifices! No, you’re just the latest on our list. Who else goes alone to pubs at regular intervals and walks unaccompanied in public gardens every weekend? Only those whom nobody will miss. You fit the perfect profile for us to rejuvenate Lord Bal while the world sleeps.”

“So you admit that Meridia pretty much decimated Molag Bal, and that he needs souls to lick his wounds,” Lloyd said without skipping a beat.

Strangely, Nurana didn’t react, not even when the Altmer gasped hoarsely. “You blaspheming worm!” the old cultist cried.

“Also, four is a pitiful number seeing how many minions you have at your disposal. It’s no wonder that the Vestige along with a ragtag contingent from two guilds was able to invade Molag Bal’s plane and wreck the place.”

“You will die a thousand deaths!” the cultist screamed shrilly.

“Anyway, I need to know the full extent of your network here on Summerset.”

“Never! I will reveal to you nothing, not even if you pluck my eyes out!”

“Yuck, no thank you,” Lloyd replied. He then looked to Nurana. “I believe I’ve gotten as much out of him as possible. Execute him and leave his body in that dried up pond in the middle here. In fact, put all of the corpses there. Call me when you finished all of them except for the Ogrim - I’ll help you with that part.”

Nurana’s nose scrunched up angrily, but she remained surprisingly subdued and withheld her usual curses. “And what will you do when I’m handling all of that, princeling?” she said, glaring at him but not making her resentment apparent in her voice.

Lloyd took his bags and walked back toward the trees where he’d been sleeping the night before. “Preparing food; I didn’t eat breakfast,” he replied without turning to face her. “Don’t worry, I’ll be ready when you’re done with the cleanup.”

He could feel her eyes burning holes in the back of his head while he walked away, yet she didn’t say a word. All he could hear was the cultist gurgling while being stabbed to death, granting Nurana a violent form of venting her anger which didn’t seem to bring her the expected gratification.


	57. A Short Rest After a Harrowing Conflict

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A sorcerer who knows better briefly entertains the thought of relaxing just after an unfamiliar daedra is bound to him. Things don’t exactly work that way.

Hardtack had never tasted so good.

That, and the piece of plain bread and a single dried apricot. Food which normally would have been an afterthought suddenly bore the flavor of a feast. In the few minutes which Lloyd spent eating, his myriad of problems disappeared from his mind, and he just savored the feeling of being alive after that morning’s harrowing ordeal. Procrastination only succeeded for so long, however, and soon enough he was interrupted when the military gait of his recently acquired companion intruded upon the bushy, secluded area where he’d slept the night before.

Nurana pushed around the branches and stood uncomfortably close to Lloyd while he sat, staring down at him with an unconcealed scowl. Dirt and blood stained her gauntlets, which she tossed on the ground next to him so dismissively that, coupled with her loathsome expression, the act seemed like a threat. Binding ritual or no, Lloyd still felt his previous comfort level decrease in her presence.

“Did you finish?” he asked, trying to maintain control of their interactions. That was either said than done.

Her sneer deepened so much that her upper lip curled and revealed her teeth. “I’m hungry. I want to eat.”

Without even asking permission, she grabbed an entire full packet of hard rations, an amount of food which he would have nibbled at slowly and made last for half a day, and put her hands all over it. Droplets of blood from all the corpses had somehow reached her hands inside of her gauntlets, staining the rations with the coppery stains and thus claiming the entire packet for her, for a single meal, all at once. Although Nurana’s manner of eating and chewing was proper and refined, the rate at which she consumed the entire packet worried Lloyd, as well as her aggression when simply taking the food from him.

Unsure of just how beholden she was to him, he tried to test the waters by pulling his travel bag away from her when she finished eating the hard rations. “That’s enough,” he said, using sweeping movements to very obviously put the bag out of her reach. She didn’t react at first, staring at him blankly like she was waiting for him to react first. “I need this food to last for at least three days. I’ll measure portions for you.”

Snide and disrespectful, she tutted her tongue at him and reached for the bag again. “Get the plague, fucknut,” she said, creatively weaving her insults and making up words. She even grabbed ahold of the bag, ignoring his words.

“Are you that eager to pass over into Aetherius?”

In a flash, Nurana visibly shuddered at his question. Rhetorical though it was, she was still deeply affected, and she finally looked at him with less loathing and more fear for the first time. If Lloyd wasn’t mistaken, she actually seemed to be at a loss for words. He wasn’t about to give up that opportunity.

“Let go of the bag,” he tried to order.

Deep in his essence, he felt the tug of a daedric minion resisting, but…there was something different. Minions he’d summoned in the past, ones which had resisted him even more, didn’t cause the same extreme sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach like Nurana did. Her willpower was strong, but also, the connection was different; she was a thrall, not a mere summon. Her resistance almost made him feel sick, and judging by the way she shifted into an upright sitting position, he guessed that she felt physically uncomfortable too.

“No,” Nurana retorted uneasily.

Drastic measures moved to the forefront of his mind, and his heart started to race again like it had when she’d been sitting on top of him plunging a knife toward his chest. Nervous, he reached toward her wrist and grabbed it tightly. “I said let go,” he repeated, wondering if he’d made a mistake.

However, she didn’t attack him like he’d worried. Unable to rebel against his actions in the same way she could against his words, she froze, holding on to the bag but not struggling against him. “N,” was all she could mumble. The muscles in her face twitched, especially near her mouth, and she could do no more than mumble the syllable.

Though still nervous, Lloyd became less so, and he felt his bravery against her grow when she didn’t push him off of her. Not wanting to leave the tension to mount, he reached with his other hand, grabbed her fingers, and peeled them off of the bag. Her unease gave way to a renewed sense of resentment, yet she allowed him to shove her hand away. She remained sitting in her spot, making no further attempt to take the food bag, seething with anger as her eyes practically burned at him.

“You’re an asshole,” she said with a shuddering breath, still uncomfortable by her own resistance to the binding.

Satisfied that he didn’t need to fear her directly, he ignored the slur and reveled in the feeling of his heart rate slowing down to a normal, healthy level. “That’s an incorrect metaphor,” he replied while tying all of the travel packs and accessories.

“You’re a salamander’s asshole,” she added through her grit teeth.

“Your insults don’t hurt me and only demonstrate how disturbed you are as a person, Nurana.”

“Don’t you dare say my name, you infected, itchy salamander’s asshole.”

“Stop talking like that right now or I won’t feed you for an entire day,” he said, finally able to speak firmly again now that he wasn’t worried that she’d murder him in his sleep anymore. She listened to him, understanding that his threat was honest. “You’ll be in my employ for a long time, so it would behoove you to do your part to get along. I promise you that, even with everything that happened before, I’ll do my best to deal with you justly.”

“Yeah right,” she grumbled, scooting in the grass and preparing to leave.

“Wait,” he said, holding a hand out to stop her. She snarled at him like a chained dog, but she did remain seated. “Listen. There are many things I’m not entirely honest about, or consistent with…I’m more flawed than most people. But if there’s one thing I do believe in as a moral principle, it’s freedom of a higher order.” She rolled her eyes, but he continued. “The freedom of speech, the freedom of information, the freedom to question and receive answers. So, I want to make a deal with you. Speak politely, avoid vulgar language, and I promise that I’ll never censor you if you feel the need to speak, to demand information, or even to criticize my plans. I don’t want Saline’s arrangement for us to be harder than it needs to.”

“There’s no way it could be any harder than this, you selfish prick.”

“What did I just say about vulgarity?”

“Lloyd, cut the shit. You’re not some magnanimous, enlightened partner extending a favor to a companion, yet you’re talking as if you are. And if you truly believe that by yourself, then your pretentious benevolence doesn’t benefit me and only demonstrates what a deluded, self-important manchild you truly are.” He recoiled at her words, surprised by how articulate she could be; he’d always made the (mistaken) assumption that foul-mouthed people weren’t able to speak eloquently or insightfully. “Yes, delusional, and in love with yourself,” she continued, “the exact stereotype of a sorcerer, seeking ego gratification by dominating your slaves.”

Alarmed and stunned into a stupor, he failed to respond cogently. “You’re not a slave!”

“Dumbass, I served the inventor of slavery until just under an hour ago; I know what it is. I’m your slave, and you’re a slaver, you amoral, ethically blind…” She stopped herself before using a dirty word again. “Don’t lecture me about beliefs and morality; you’re as hypocritical as all mortals are. You want to do me a favor? Spare me the lectures about right and wrong, about your stupid fantasies of freedom, about how you accept criticism. I won’t ever believe you or take you seriously. Just tell me what you need done and leave me alone.”

A long silence passed between them as she stared at him. She maintained the stare down, saying nothing and forcing him to speak first. Even if she couldn’t rebel against his actions, he realized that she was adamant about not liking every moment they spent together.

“So you just want to know about the mission I’m currently on?” he asked, but she only continued staring and didn’t answer. “Fine. We have a three day trek westward, if we take only minimal rests. We might not make much progress today either, because I need to take the linens in my bag and duplicate the chameleon enchantment…well, you don’t know what I’m talking about, I guess, but basically I need us to be hidden and discreet if we’re to sleep in roadside inns rather than in the woods.”

Though she still looked unhappy being around him, talk of the mission got her to respond again. “Why do we need to move westward?” Nurana asked flatly, with a forced calm in her voice.

“Well, this is a bit complicated in terms of steps, but the first goal is to reach a secret Thalmor prison outside of Alinor-“

“No!” she shouted without escalation, looking at him with sincere shock. “Damnit, what do you not understand about my animus being tied to your soul? You’re going to get us BOTH killed trying to fight the Thalmor!”

“We can do this, especially now that we have your help.”

“Let Saline go by himself, there doesn’t need to be any ‘we’ involved!”

Lloyd waved his hand at her, innocently trying to explain the mission. “It’s not Saline; he only offered to help if we need it. It’s Tammaeroth! The Thalmor took her prisoner, and we need to bust her out-“

Lloyd’s sentence was cut off again, this time by Nurana screaming. She didn’t really scream words, or at least, any coherent words. It was more like an angry growl, but sustained like a scream, and Lloyd almost laughed because she sounded so weird. Her eyes looked as if they were ablaze with fury.

“What! What! What!”

“Hey, keep your voice down,” he whispered, though he had no reason to.

“What the hell is wrong with you, you, you, you, RRRRRRRRR!”

“Nurana, please calm down.”

Jumping to her feet, she grabbed a rock and hurled it at a nearby tree. “A CURSE ON YOU, ROLSEN! A CURSE ON YOU FOR PUTTING MY FUTURE AT RISK FOR THAT RRRRRRR!”

“Nurana, I can’t understand what you’re saying-“

One final scream marked the end of her rant as she stormed off, walking out of the bushy area and back toward the corpse pile in the glade. Flesh slapped on a hard surface as she released her anger by desecrating the corpses of her former comrades. “I HATE YOU ROLSEN!” she screamed while beating the cultist’s corpse with the man’s own shoes.


	58. Failed Negotiation of Terms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A creature borne of domination and hierarchy will not be able to intelligently explain what it wants when faced with an unafraid, scrutinizing interlocutor. “Because of reasons” isn’t likely to work on someone who isn’t scared of you.

Lloyd spent the next few minutes sitting still in the bushes, listening to Nurana as she ran around and screamed in the glade. They were both lucky that they were so far from the main road because in any other place, she would have given their position away. As much as his fears had been allayed when he'd discovered that the binding magic prevented her from disobeying him, the sheer amount of rage she poured into the glade was intimidating. He'd always thought of the Dark Seducers as being one of the least scary races of daedra…maybe they were, and Nurana was just psychotically violent.

In a flash, she dashed from the glade, around the bushes, and burst through behind Lloyd. He yelped and twisted around defensively only to find her glaring and pointing at him spitefully rather than attacking him. Her teeth were grinding so hard that he worried she might break them out of her own mouth.

"Fuck you, Rolsen!" she shrieked at him, and then she promptly stormed out of the bushes and returned to the glade.

For the next minute or so, she stabbed the corpses of her former allies, taking out her anger on the fallen of Coldharbour. The sounds were sickening, and Lloyd tried not to imagine which body parts were being broken and torn. A few seconds later, Nurana burst through the bushes to one side, surprising him again with how fast she was.

"Gah! Nurana!"

"You stupid fuck!" she hissed before stomping off again.

"Nurana, wait! Stop doing this and just listen for a-"

She burst in through the bushes on the opposite side, appearing to be in all places at once due to her speed. Her fury only grew each time she jabbed her finger at him, for pointing was all she could do given the magical prevention of violence in her part. "A curse on you and anybody else named Lloyd!" Nurana hissed before disappearing out of his view. She began casting her newly acquired lightning spells on the dead bodies, even disintegrating one of them.

"Will you calm down for a second-"

His request struck a nerve, and she screamed so much that her voice gave out again. She began hacking and coughing but still found the vocal clarity to say: "FUCK YOU I WILL NOT CALM DOWN! AAAAAAHHHH!"

Although he was still a little intimidated, he was also growing frustrated at the inability to carry on a conversation with a person - demon, being, entity, whatever - with whom he'd have to cooperate closely. Cautiously, he stood and walked out into the glade and immediately cringed when he found her kicking around the severed head of a Scamp. Holding out a hand in case he had to defend himself, no matter how low the chance, he cleared his throat. "I order you to sit down and be quiet!"

"Argh!" Nurana grunted in reaction to his words, doubling over in pain. Lloyd felt it as well, wincing as he felt a minor stomach cramp, though the battle of wills was undoubtedly more difficult on the demon. In contrast, Nurana trembled, but she recovered very quickly. With one arm hugged across her midsection, she reached to the ground and laboriously helped herself sit down. "Damn you, damn you to the scathe-rings," she muttered. But in the end, she still followed his orders.

Nervous but determined, Lloyd sat down across from her and tried to collect his thoughts. Dealing with Nurana wasn't easy. "Thank you for taking a seat," he said, though his overture was obviously rejected when she sneered at him in between gasping in pain. "Now, in a calm and respectful manner, could you please tell me why you're so angered by our mission?"

She spat on the grass and looked back up at him, angry but visibly shaken by the binding. "I could, but I don't want to," she replied with an obviously forced, inauthentic calm.

"If you don't voice your concerns, then we'll carry on as I'd intended; I won't change any part of my plans. Is that what you prefer, Nurana?"

She bristled when he said her name but remained civil. "I prefer…" She stopped herself, an insult clearly on the tip of her tongue, but she controlled herself. "I don't want any of this. I want to go back to Coldharbour." This time when she paused, a deep frown marked with traumatic shock came to the fore, almost making the bloodthirsty demon look pitiful. "I want to go home."

"You can't go home, and I'm not sorry to say that; you shouldn't have tried to kill Tammaeroth and kidnap me. What I can offer you, though, is a less stressful life for the time that we work together. Maybe even the least stressful arrangement for you, if you're polite and cooperate."

"We're not working together; I'm your slave," she repeated, her voice tainted with dejection. "Conjuration and summoning magic is slavery. Mortal mages are slavers. You blaspheme the name of Molag Bal with your imperfect imitation of his dominion."

"Last I checked, only aedra and mortals can create; daedra only copy and change, but whatever. And I won't try to change your view of our arrangement - you have the right to think whatever you want, and only you are responsible for how you feel, so I won't bend over backwards to argue philosophy with you. Let's focus on solving our problem here: you're upset with the mission. Your reaction was clear and intense. Is there anything about the mission you want to discuss?"

"Don't do it," she said with a sense of urgency, looking up at him again. "You're a sorcerer; you know that I'll die forever if you die and take me to Aetherius."

"The mission can't be cancelled, but I'm open to changing the exact plans. You obviously have more combat experience than a mortal, so-"

Her dark violet eyes lit up with desperation. "Yes, I'm an expert! I'm a Kiskengo! You can't go, my calculations say that you're destined to fail!"

"Nurana, you don't even know the details yet, and you haven't had enough time to calculate anything. Look, I'm trying to have a serious conversation-"

"No, I'm telling you the truth! You're an idiotic mortal youth opposing the most secretive unit of an entire government. You're going to get killed, and even worse than that, I'm going to get killed! And I won't come back, I…" She cupped her hands on her cheeks and curled into a ball. "No, no, why are you doing this! I'll do anything you say, just don't let me die!"

"Well," he sighed, "I am mortal; I'm going to die of old age eventually. If there's a way to delay that as much as possible, I'd love to hear your thoughts given your experience. That's why I'm asking you: we're about to journey westward for about three days-"

"No! No, no, no, no, no!"

"-while disguised. We'll mostly say off of the main roads, but we'll stay in small inns off the beaten path if we can find them. Is there anything, from this beginning phase, that you think should be changed?"

"Yes, we need to go eastward and get off this island! We need to…to…no! Argh!"

"What?" he asked.

"If I take you to Coldharbour, you'll probably die from stupidity. If you're here on Nirn, you'll probably die from whatever your kind dies from." She squeezed herself into an even tighter ball, not caring how crazy she looked. "Why are you doing this to me?"

"I told you: you tried to kill Tammaeroth, which would have been awful for her, if not permanent. And you tried to kidnap me, likely to be sacrificed. We're going to talk about that, by the way." Standing up and dusting off his pants, he ignored the way she stared at him from the corner of his eye. "For now, I need to get to work. I have an enchanted cloak which will cause people to ignore you; you're going to wear that so nobody, you know, figures out that you're a daedra and calls the authorities. It was supposed to be for me, so I'm going to throw together another disguise." He stopped and glanced at the Molag Bal cultist, battered and bloody on the ground. "I can try to clean that up and throw it together with a hat. Especially once I tear off those emblems of Molag Bal and burn them."

Instead of growling when he mentioned the debasement of artifacts of the Schemer, Nurana just groaned. Soundly defeated once she'd realized the reality of her situation. She remained laying there in the grass until he'd finished all of their preparations, not saying a word until he'd come to fetch her an hour later.


	59. Stupid Questions Before They Leave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dressing up a daedra as your traveling buddy and speaking nicely to them doesn’t make them your travel buddy.

Lloyd finished adjusting Nurana's hood such that her face wouldn't be visible. The dejected, defeated look on her face was now concealed by the fabric, though her shoulders still slumped. "Voila," he said once she was fully disguised. She looked much better than he did, what with his tattered black robes with the holes and outlines of stitching which had been ripped out, or the wide-rimmed, dark brown hat which didn't match at all. The beige travel bags they were both carrying just destroyed their style, though, condemning them to some weird pocket of Mundus in which fashion sense wasn't a thing.

He pulled out their map and held it up in front of her. "So we’re about here, just a day east of Rellentil. The full travel time between Rellenthil and Shimmerene, by the way, is only four days; I'd thought it was a full week, but I was wrong. Probably because of the winding route Tammaeroth and I had taken from Alinor. We're actually not doing bad for time."

Nurana sighed deeply. "Okay," she muttered without looking up.

Not wanting to leave his only ally not in a jail cell feeling so unmotivated, Lloyd ignored Nurana's blue mood and tried to focus on the mission. "The sun is high, but the heat of the day has lingered for a while, so it isn't noon anymore. If I remember correctly, and I might not, then there's this little inn just beyond Rellenthil. It's off the main road, to the east of a sideroad leading south, alongside a stable and some chicken coops. No farms, so it's really remote. The place sees enough local travelers, though, that we should blend in. We can make it there for tomorrow night, but for tonight, I think we'll end up camping in between here and Rellenthil. We shouldn't really go near there."

"Okay," Nurana sighed again while he rolled up the map and put it back in its canister.

Once he'd tied his bag closed, he turned to face her. "Anything else before we leave?" he asked as cheerily as he could, though she only nodded her hung head without looking up. "Alright then; we'll take one break along the way."

With that, the two of them began to retrace his footsteps over the previous day. Like Tammaeroth, Nurana didn't say much as they traveled; unlike Tammaeroth, Nurana didn't seem naturally given to silence. Her condition was as poor emotionally as it was great physically. Lloyd gave her some space, however, for the first two hours of their trek. Nurana didn't say a word.

At that point, though, he felt it acceptable to finally speak. They were still just barely within view of the main road out on the plains and hills, but in remote enough an area such that nobody traveling on that main road would pay attention to them.

"So, Nurana…why were you and your former allies trying to kidnap me?" he asked with feigned nonchalance.

The way she drew such a deep breath implied that she wasn't impressed by his attempt. "To sacrifice you. Just like everybody else we kidnap."

"Hmm. I figured as much." He paused for a whole minute before continuing. "Why me specifically, though?"

Surprisingly, and ironically, questions which annoyed her seemed to rejuvenate her mental energy. He could hear her sneer and grimace beneath her low hanging hood. "Is that even a serious question? Because you're a loser. Nobody cares about you. You spent a year sleeping on people's couches and drifting around guild halls like a parasite. Nobody misses a person like you."

"I'm guessing your allies, former allies, must have been watching me closely."

She snorted. "Don't think yourself so important, mortal."

"It's Lloyd."

"Not to me. You're just another doomed creature of Mundus among many. The few among your ilk who recognize the Schemer's domination are rewarded with being our agents; they specialize in scouting out loners whom nobody would miss."

"So mortal agents were stalking me?" he asked curiously.

"Yes," she replied without hesitation. "We train them to stalk our prey for us, and catch them at their most vulnerable. We knew you'd be arrested that night, and you must be stunningly inattentive not to have known. Even the Magister of the Mages Guild knew."

Immediately frowning, he felt a pang of shock in the back of his head. "Enalde knew they were coming…" He tried to compose himself, though the sting felt even harder when he glanced at Nurana and realized that she wasn't even taunting him; she'd just mentioned it as a matter of fact yet it still hurt. "Enalde was so nice; she's the most popular recruiter on the entire island. Why wouldn't she warn me? I'd seen her that very night; she passed right by the study where I'd been reading. She didn't even say anything."

"Yes, well, what do you expect from mortals delusionally arrogant enough to claim descent from et'Ada like the elves? They're even dumber than humans."

Though shocked by the insinuation that his guild recruiter had allowed him to be taken by the authorities, he was relieved that Nurana was opening up in spite of her hostility. He needed her to be alert and cooperative in case they were attacked; he'd also prefer her to keep talking and spilling information. "So…okay, so…it wasn't personal when I was targeted, then?"

Nurana snorted again, this time even more scornful. "It's never person against a person whom nobody would miss; it's the opposite of personal."

"And I wasn't targeted for anything special? I was just noticed?"

"Yes, genius, like I already told you."

"So why continue this if the Planemeld already failed?" he asked, trying to sound as unaggressive as he could.

She didn't answer for a few seconds. They just continued walking, and though he didn't turn back to look at her, he noticed her shifting uncomfortably. She must have realized that he was pumping her for information.

"All of your questions are stupid," she muttered while shaking her head.

They didn't speak again until they stopped to rest and eat.


	60. They Speculate by a Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At camp that night, the sorcerer and the Seducer manage to have a civil conversation. Stress mounts for both of them in different ways, however, due to their situation.

The day unfolded without issue, leading them to a spot just ten miles east of Rellenthil. Even during their rest break earlier in the day, Nurana had remained civil, merely asking about food and water without throwing around anymore insults. Lloyd was thoroughly impressed, enough that he gave her a little more water when she'd asked.

In the evening, they'd chosen a wooded area not far from a lake, allowing them to refill the waterskin before they set up camp. He busied himself setting up a modest campfire after he'd unfurled their bedrolls, leaving Nurana to scout around and set up defensive stakes around their campsite. He'd thought her efforts to be over the top, but he didn't mind. In the back of his mind, a part of him had missed the ease brought by daedric minions which he'd known in Stross M'Kai, when he'd been freer to research whatever magic he'd wanted.

Eventually, Nurana returned, wiping dirt from her palms and knees in irritation. She didn't even bother looking at Lloyd as she sat on her bedroll across the campfire, merely clasping her hands over her knees and staring into the dirt. He'd already set up everything for them to get right to bed, seeing as how the sun had set, but her mind was clearly occupied.

"Is everything secure?" he asked her. She only nodded and continued staring tensely. He saw no reason to hold back in his line of questions since they'd spoken so little that day. "You're with me in all of this, right?"

"I don’t have a choice, you distinguished scholar, you," she replied with derision.

"You're ready for whatever we might face, right?" he asked.

"Readier than you are," she replied without skipping a beat. Her tension didn't dissipate, though.

Sitting up straight, he tried to think of ways to help his demonic companion get to sleep. "Do you know Tammaeroth?" he asked with caution.

Her response was swift. "Better than you do. Well enough to know that she isn't worth your effort."

He ignored the slur and held his tongue, not wanting to share information she could exploit. "So the two of you have met?"

"No," Nurana said even more swiftly. "Thank the Schemer for that. Her reputation…well, she's nothing. She has no reputation. I just happen to know a lot about people. I have contacts in Coldharbour."

Nurana's countenance was difficult to understand. Lloyd knew that, behind those dark violet eyes, there lived a world of hate and atrocities she must have visited on countless mortals - and good daedra, if the expression made sense. She seemed to be a true believer in the message of a demon lord nicknamed the 'King of Rape,' a term so disgusting that Lloyd found even entertaining such a message unforgiveable. Yet when Nurana spoke of the plane which she'd once called home, there was almost a measure of innocent sadness in her eyes. He'd seen sadness in Tammaeroth, but it wasn't innocent despite her having little to no hostility toward mortal life; Tammaeroth was marked by her world weariness. Yet Nurana, also from Oblivion and likely just as acquainted with the horrors of hellish landscapes, almost appeared…immature. Her sadness was that of a teenager who'd been denied some trivial matter, signaling a lack of vision and foresight. For a split second, Lloyd almost felt sorry for her, even if he internally chastised himself for pitying such an irredeemable creature.

"Look…I don't know how all of this works," he said slowly and doubtfully. "My experience with daedra and your magic has been in controlled academic settings until, well, when all of this started. But I think that, when this current problem is solved, you won't be going back to Coldharbour." She turned to look at him, angrily at first but then worryingly when she saw that he wasn't mocking her. "I'm not sure; it's just a theory. When we get Saline what he wants, we'll also bust Tammaeroth out of jail and head to Shimmerene; there's a skein there, one waiting for me specifically. We'll travel through Oblivion, at which point Saline's master, Hermaeus Mora, will consider our mission accomplished.

"What I'm saying is, in a roundabout way…I don't think Coldharbour will be your home anymore. You'll probably be expected to establish an oath bond with Mora and break the oath you have with Bal. I'm not sure where we'll go on Nirn, but your home plane of Oblivion will probably, I'm not sure but probably, be Apocrypha."

At first, Nurana didn't react, and Lloyd feared that his attempt to help her relax had failed. After a few seconds, though, he saw a partial success when her tension drained out; instead of pulling tight with stress, her shoulders slumped down into a sort of depressed state. The intensity disappeared from her gaze, and she looked away from him with about as much energy as a pig in mud. Without a word, she turned away from him and laid down on top of her open bedroll without even changing her clothes and pulled her blanket halfway over herself. Her body gradually settled down, and she breathed deeply and slowly within minutes.

She hadn't taken the news as well as he'd hoped, but she was at least loose enough to sleep, if not truly relaxed. With that, Lloyd slipped into his bedroll and went to sleep himself, still unsure if he could truly count on his new minion.


	61. Bound and Gagged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bound daedra is supposed to follow its conjurer’s orders...but a bound conjurer can’t issue orders.

The sound of digging was what finally woke Lloyd up. In the middle of a pleasant dream about freshly printed ink and mint tea, the sound of metal scraping on dirt invaded his dream world from the real world. Groggy and disoriented, he woke up to find himself face down in the grass, a position he never slept in. Confusion at being in such a position pushed him through his drowsiness; realization that his arms were stuck in his bedroll pushed him into a state of alarm.

Squirming and twisting to get his arms free, he grew frustrated when he found the various folds of his bedroll and blanket wrapped too tightly around his limbs for him to move. He struggled and stretched, becoming worried when he felt a scarf from his travel bag being slipped over his head. Fingers, soft yet strong, pricked around his ears like a spider’s legs, causing him to jerk around at what he assumed was Nurana ineffectively trying to wake him up without yelling.

“Mff,” he mumbled into the scarf, failing to ask her to help him crawl out of the bedroll as she pulled the scarf tight around his mouth.

When he felt her fingers tying the scarf behind his head, he fell into full-blown panic mode and yelled into the fabric of the scarf. His limbs weren’t simply tangled in the folds of his blanket; he’d been tied up inside of it with pieces of cord she’d pilfered from his bags. He fought and twisted and turned but to no avail; as soon as he rolled himself over, she sat on him to hold him still. Darkness overhead obscured her face, signaling that she’d put out their campfire. The starlight above meant that she hadn’t even waited until morning to subdue him, and she may not have fallen asleep at all. He didn’t need much time to figure out what was going on.

Fighting to move, he found himself pinned when she sank all of her weight onto his hips. It was the same position when she’d wrestled him to the ground and nearly stabbed him to death that morning, and the sense of déjà vu terrified him. She made no move to actually hurt him, however, which meant that she was still bound to him.

“Shut up,” she ordered, scooping his head up in her hands so she could finish tying the ends of the scarf to gag him. Regarding him as little more than a farm animal, she finished tying the scarf without explaining what was going on. As soon as she tried to stand up, though, he bucked and squirmed in an attempt to roll away, and she pinned him to the ground again.

Bending down, she glared directly at him, moving closely enough for him to see her in the dark. She was still wearing the enchanted cloak he’d given her, and all the travel bags were strapped over her shoulders. She bared her pearly white teeth at him menacingly.

“You stupid fuck, you didn’t tell me that there’s a way into Oblivion from this island,” she hissed at him. Her fingers tightened on the edges of the scarf, not hurting him but frightening him with how tense her hands were. “If you won’t take care of yourself, then I will.”

“Mff!”

“Shut up or I’ll tighten the gag! If anybody sees or hears you, you’ll get us both killed!” Still angry, her face did loosen up a little, and she stopped squeezing the scarf. “You’re not going to kill me, you selfish clump of pondscum. You have no idea what it’s like for one of us…” Nurana paused, her anger momentarily giving way to an emotional gasp of fear and self-pity, like a caged tigress backed into a corner. “…what it’s like for me to face permanent death. You worm, you insignificant little flea, your mortal lifespan is going to expire in the blink of an eye and then your soul will drag my vestige with you to Aetherius.”

Satisfied that he was listening, she sat upright and let go of his head entirely, flicking his bedroll wrappings derisively as a show of disrespect, like she was actually flicking a flea off of her arm. “No. Not me. You, a useless Nirnspawn like you, will not drag me into the Void. I’m dragging your stupid ass into that skein into Oblivion until I can find my way back to Coldharbour, where at least I know I can prevent you from being outright killed. You’ll be my prisoner until I can find a way to make you immortal because that’s the only way to protect you from you own stupid ideas and protect me from dying forever.”

Pushing on his chest to help herself stand, she cut off his oxygen for a second without actually hurting him. He then saw that she’d wrapped a rope around his ankles; she tied the other end around her shoulder with the travel bags. “Word of advice, dipshit: never sleep around a daedric thrall without giving more specific orders. My only orders so far have been to keep you alive…you never specified how. So…fuck you. I win.”

She then began to walk, heaving as she pulled on the rope. Lloyd felt his back sliding over the grass and lump soil as she dragged him, watching the stars pass overhead. He screamed into the scarf in futility, disoriented as she moved him against his will and dragged him back toward the east.


	62. Free at Last

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As perilous as binding a daedra can be for a mortal, being bound to a mortal can be dangerous for a daedra. The only question is who will make a mistake first.

Nurana seemed to have underestimated the physics of Mundus.

For the first few minutes, she dragged Lloyd along the ground, power walking over dips and rocks as his body rolled around on the uneven ground. Though the trek was painful for him every time she dragged him over a rock, she seemed satisfied that she’d gotten the upper hand without disobeying the curse which bound the two of them together. She pushed on.

By half an hour, though, she seemed to have come to a shocking realization: on the plane of Nirn, people have to eat, drink, and rest. That included immortal demonic people from other planes of existence.

Sure, that’s required in Oblivion as well, but to a lesser degree, as Lloyd had read. She didn’t seem to have realized what she was doing to herself by not sleeping and dragging another person’s body over the ground. After that first half hour, she began panting and breathing heavily, and she walked at a slower pace than she had before. When they neared a full hour of her dragging him back toward the east, he heard the rope hit the ground when she stopped for a break. The sound of all the travel bags hitting the ground reached his ears too, and he heard her fiddling with the bags as she tried to untie them.

“Where’s the water,” she muttered while hopelessly trying to untie the buttons and strings holding the bags closed. “Huh?” she asked more harshly when he didn’t respond. “I’m talking to you Rolsen!” She both of their travel bags and put them on the ground next to his head, where he could see. “Which one has the water inside?” she asked indignantly.

He stared up at her, also tired after being woken up so rudely, but nowhere near as tired as her, and in a much better condition to act stubborn. He didn’t even try to express his defiance with his eyebrows; he just stared at her, much to her ire.

“I’m going to die of thirst, idiot; then you’ll have nobody to protect you out here,” she warned, though he only continued to stare at her. Sweat dripped off of her brow and she pulled the hood off of her head entirely. “Damnit, you puerile piece of monkey crap, answer me!” she yelled in vain. He actually started to look up at the stars, ignoring her entirely. “Fuck you,” she said, giving up quickly when she was underslept, fatigued, and thirsty. She tried to open the bags on her own again. “When we get to Coldharbour, I’ll find a way to keep you alive forever and incapacitated so you can’t order me around. You’ll see.”

As soon as she knelt down to open the bags, he began to wriggle his wrists and knees and arched his neck, trying any movement to work his way out of the cocoon she’d wrapped around him. She noticed immediately and left the bags, rushing over to her to prevent his escape. “Knock it off you dingbat, you’ll hurt yourself!” she said while trying to hold him down. She then noticed that he was starting to swallow the scarf on purpose. “No, you moron, you’ll suffocate!”

She began picking at the scarf, being careful not to get her fingers caught between his teeth as she tried to pull it out of his mouth. He actually started to gag for real, resisting his body’s healthy reaction to push out whatever was in his throat with all of his willpower. Nurana fell into a full-fledged panic, much more severe than his when he’d woken up restrained, and she tore the scarf off of his face to prevent him from swallowing it.

“Untie me!” Lloyd yelled as fast as he could the very moment he felt his mouth uncovered again.

No sooner had the words come out of his mouth then she had fallen back, shocked by the undoing of her plan. “No!” she replied, foolishly, as the resistance to his verbal command caused a violent reaction. The blue glow of conjuration magic lit her up, resonating from her bones so brightly that he could see the outlines through the cloak she was wearing. She gripped her head in reaction to a terrible migraine, rolling around as her entire body appeared to be in pain. “Rolsen, don’t do this!”

“Untie me right now, Nurana!” he ordered a second time.

He didn’t have to order her a third. Scared by the pain of resisting Saline’s conjuration curse, she crawled over the dirt and released him from the blanket cocoon. The glow dissipated and her body returned to normal, if winded. Lloyd kicked the blankets off of him and stood up, barefoot and shirtless in the night, very much awake after the ordeal. He took one of the bags, fished his clothing and socks out of it, and began to look around. “Where are my shoes?” he asked before anything else.

Panting and dismayed, Nurana just stayed on her hands and knees, head hung low. “I left them where we’d camped,” she gasped.

Finally angry himself, and terrified of what she was capable of, he collected a list of overreacting cautions in his head while he put his clothes back on. “Alright, let’s get one thing straight: if you try to hinder our mission again, I’ll command you to kill yourself. Temporarily, but have fun swimming in the Void for awhile. Understood?” She only nodded without looking up. “Good. If you ever restrain me again, take me to a place you know I don’t want to go, or jump around screaming like a foul-mouthed fanatic again, I’ll starve you for a whole day. Understood?”

“Understood,” she gasped again.

“Don’t take my manners for weakness; I’ve summoned sentient daedra long before your agents were ever stalking me on this island; I’m not some novice mage here for you to play games with. If you pull any more sneaky stunts like this, or feign ignorance while doing something you know I’d order you not to, I’ll order you so stand aside while I go do a bunch of dangerous quests where I might get killed by myself and leave you alone to worry that I’ll die and take you with me-“

“Please don’t,” she begged, though she was too tired and depressed to put much feeling into her voice.

“Then do what I tell you and don’t try to stop me from carrying out orders again.” Too upset to offer her any reconciliation, at least not more than he’d offered the Scamps and Xivilai he’d practiced summoning years ago, he didn’t bother with any small talk. “Now, you’re carrying everything. All of it. Get my bedroll, the rope, the bags, all of it, and follow me back to where we were camping. Then you’re setting up camp again, exactly as it was, and I’m not helping with anything. Only when I say you’re finished can you have a sip of water.”

Without waiting for her reply, or even for her to gather up their belongings, he started to walk away. A part of him did feel guilty for how harsh his reaction was, and even when he reminded himself that she was trying to kidnap and take him to Coldharbour again, there was that nagging voice in the back of his head reminding him that he was’t behaving like a gentleman. He sighed and frowned deeply as he walked ahead of her, trying not to think about how much she was affecting his behavior.


	63. They Find Their Campsite Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two of them manage to find the same site they’d camped at, undisturbed in the wilderness.

It took them more than an hour to return to their campsite. Nurana lagged behind, being underslept and burdened by all of their travel gear, though walking in the wilderness at night didn't help either. Even Lloyd wasn't entirely sure that they were going the right way until, to their luck, he stumbled upon his missing shoes and her discarded bedroll. He felt a wave of relief wash over him when he found their belongings undisturbed, though there wasn't anybody out there to pilfer their bags anyway.

He turned back to see the faint outline of Nurana far behind him, huffing and puffing as she carried all of their stuff. A measure of guilt still nipped at Lloyd's psyche in spite of all logic dictating that a demoness who spent her existence abducting people for mortal sacrifice deserved none. As he rekindled a modest campfire, he tried to convince himself that he was only doing it as a beacon rather than to make her job easier, but he was so disappointed with his own actions in multiple ways that he walked off before she reached their campsite and leaned against a nearby tree. They didn't even look at each other when she finally arrived, dumped all of their stuff on the ground, and struggled to get the enchanted cloak off, nearly falling in to the campfire in the process. All of her usual agility and flexibility was gone, sapped by taxing herself too much for the natural laws of the mortal plane.

While she busied herself setting up their camp again, he just stared into the darkness of the hills to the south. Perhaps it was his conservative, lower class upbringing, but he found himself disturbed by the harshness of his reaction to her treachery. He shouldn't have felt as such…another mental prison he built for himself.

The sound of snoring caused him to turn around. He looked back and saw her asleep on her bedroll, out cold before she'd even asked him for water. The weariness experienced on Mundus seemed, for her, similar to the reaction of mortals from coastal plains rapidly traveling to lands of high elevation; the change in environment was taking its toll.

He returned to his own bedroll and laid down, letting the fabric lay open to prevent it from being wrapped around him again. It took him a long time to fall asleep.


	64. Intentions Revealed...Sort Of

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a sorcerer learns a hard lesson about watching what he says in front of a bound yet recalcitrant daedra.

Both of them woke up late, long after the sun had risen. They were both still tired, having been fatigued by Nurana's attempted change in plans last night, but eventually Lloyd forced her to get up just as he'd forced himself. After a reasonable period of time to freshen up - especially for him to wash his feet in the nearby lake, given how far he'd walked barefoot the previous night - they set off to the west again. They veered far to the southwest to avoid any sight of Rellenthil, though they had to mostly walk uphill for the whole day.

Nurana was expectedly quiet, her ego soundly hammered down after their previous battle of wills. She even walked with her arms folded for most of the walk, a comfortable position since she'd somehow still subtly convinced Lloyd to take turns carrying the bags so she could rest. He shook his head at himself and pledged to make her work even harder for her the next day, wondering how such a foul creature managed to appear so pitiful despite her crimes against humanity.

Eventually, she began to complain of being hungry and tired. Ignoring her for a good long time, he made her wait until past noon, wanting to save their rest time for the hottest part of the day. They found a crevice overlooking a forested hill across from them and sat down after running a check for wolves or griffins. Rather than gobbling everything up the way Tammaeroth would, Nurana ate more slowly, truly enjoying her meagre meal. Seeing as how she'd previously been dejected and was now satisfied with a bit of food, Lloyd tried to make peace with her.

"Are you well?" he asked.

Despite having been quiet all day, she was immediately ready for the exchange. "No," she replied assuredly. "I'm enslaved by a mortal sorcerer with a death wish."

He nodded and decided to choose his words carefully. "Perhaps if we discuss the details of the mission, your concerns would be allayed." She rolled her eyes at him skeptically but didn't speak, so he determined that he'd change her mind. "So there are two objectives to our mission, and one location. The location is a secret Thalmor prison just outside of Alinor, right?" She didn't reply, merely sipping on their waterskin like it was a wine glass and watching the tree branches outside the crevice. "Right," he continued. "So this place called the crucible, it's on our map, but it isn't labeled. This is supposed to be top secret - supposedly, it's where they send political prisoners and religious heretics. They even keep daedra there, at least for a time."

"So that's where you want to take me," Nurana muttered at him passive aggressively. "Great."

"Come on now, I wouldn't joke in a discussion like this. Focus. So that's the location, this secret prison, and it looks like an abandoned warehouse on the outside. The Thalmor aren't likely to have patrolmen on foot around the place; that isn't their style. I can imagine magical wards, though, which I can recognize. I'll need your help to infiltrate the place, though, because I'm sure you're far better at that than I." He waited for another reaction, but she was giving him the silent treatment. "Okay, so we have two objectives, right? The subsidiary objective, or maybe we can call it the secondary, is to obtain any and all secret records which the Thalmor are keeping there. Any ledgers, itineraries, letters, documents, reports, whatever we can find, Saline wants it. Forbidden knowledge for Apocrypha, right? Nurana? Right. So our second mission is to extract Tammaeroth. She was captured by the Thalmor almost four days ago, and she's been taken there. She'll most likely be interrogated so they can figure out where I am, seeing as how there's still a warrant out for my arrest-"

"Tammaeroth is dead," Nurana said, interrupting him. The slight smile at one corner of her mouth, which she quickly suppressed, made it apparent that she was making it up.

"I don't leave a comrade behind, so for the purpose of our mission, we're assuming that she's alive and waiting for us."

"No, you're lying to yourself, Rolsen. Just summon Saline again when we're there and let him get the documents yourself. Then he can send us to Shimmerene."

"See, that's the thing. The skein, this cut into Oblivion near Shimmerene, it's part of Tammaeroth's original mission. She was tasked with extracting me from the island to save me from the Thalmor and, well, your former allies, along with other undesirable peoples."

"But the portal doesn't need her to open, right? You said it will open for you," she countered.

"Yes, I can leave, but Tammaeroth is probably being tortured in a Thalmor prison-"

"And deservedly so," Nurana said, interrupting for a second time. "Let the strong punish the weak."

Lloyd grit his teeth behind his lips, a subtle reaction Nurana noticed. "You're free to cling to whatever baggage you carry with you from Oblivion, but all the same-"

"You can just get Saline his stupid papers and save your own hide, dummy. And mine."

"All the same, excuse you, you're still a part of my team, which makes Tammaeroth a part of your team-"

"Oh, you presumptuous prick! Don't mention me alongside that weakling!"

"Nurana, please stay on topic; I opened this discussion to allay your fears-"

"You're only increasing them, you dimwitted descendant of half-bred Direnni! You have a clear path to get exactly what Saline wants and then save yourself, stop dreaming like a child!"

"Nurana, even from a utilitarian standpoint, we'll already be right where Tammaeroth is being held-"

"She nearly killed me; you do realize that, right? She beat me unconscious and left me in a burning sewer chamber next to a giant salamander eating a corpse."

"Okay, there are many ways to respond to that," he said as fast as he could given how fast she was to interrupt him, "but I'm trying to have a mature discussion."

"A mature person would realize that you already have a slave to do your bidding right here," she said, angrily pointing at herself, "and that you're putting yourself at risk for a ridiculous, moronic fantasy of saving a person who doesn't give two shits about you anyway!"

"I offered to discuss the details, not the mission itself-"

"Do you think that you know Tammaeroth like other daedra do, by the way? I know people in Oblivion, Lloyd, people who hear and see everything. No matter how much she pretends to enjoy your company, she's going to stab you in the back in the end, just like I would."

"That's just your opinion-"

"Did she tell you a sob story about her clan being betrayed and sent to Aetherius where they'd permanently die? As in forever?" Nurana asked pointedly, gaining her usual fury once more.

"Yes-"

"And did she tell you that it was her and her three coconspirators that betrayed them?" Lloyd paused in shock and stammered, realizing too late that his utter disbelief was out in the open. Nurana actually grinned wide like a shark smelling blood in the water. "That's right, she's a Dremora without honor, the worst thing in Oblivion. She betrayed her own people, something that no other Dremora has ever done, but when she escaped here to Mundus she hid that part of her story from the old mortal lady who'd summoned her. She thought she could hide it from Hermaeus Mora's little poodle Kixathi too."

"Gossip doesn't help me or you-"

"Open your eyes, Rolsen! It's not gossip, it's the plain truth that anybody who's heard of Tammaeroth knows! She's a bad joke in Oblivion for the few who've actually heard of her, and there aren't many, but she's an example of everything that her own half-witted, weak race believes to be wrong! Why waste your time on a miserable miscreant who's maligned by her own people?"

"That specific detail isn't open for discussion-"

"Why? You said you believe in freedom of speech, you academic fraud!"

"Watch what you say very carefully," Lloyd said, aware that he was letting her get to him too much even while it was happening. She saw that attacking his ideals was a weak spot, though, and she latched on like a trained guard dog.

"So now I have to watch what I say! So much for you telling me that I was free to speak my mind under your authority. So I'm a slave and you're risking your life for that…"

Her voice trailed off, but Lloyd misread her reaction and retorted. "At no point have I used my magic to force you to stay silent - just to keep the volume of your voice low. Wait, what's wrong?"

Nurana scooted away from him and started to stand up, staring at him like he were a ghost. Except she'd probably seen plenty of ghosts while working with the Worm Cult, so she couldn't be looking at anything but him. "Oh my Void, you have to be kidding me," she gasped slowly, her facial features an imbalanced mosaic of dismay, shock, and anger as she twitched oddly.

"What? What's your problem?" he asked.

"You stupid…holy shit…Rolsen…you're falling for her, aren't you?"

Pulling his face and mouth tightly, he tried to stave off any outward reaction. "No," he said a little too forcefully. "I never leave an ally behind. Shame on you for assuming-"

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Nurana said while walking away, out of the crevice. "Fuck, no, of all the bad luck, this is the person I'm stuck serving?"

"Nurana-"

"A mortal manchild developing a crush on fucking Tammaeroth Twice Dishonored? What the shit, I'm-" She turned back to Lloyd with that same bile on her tongue that he'd heard from her the night they'd met. "You're forcing ME to risk MY life for that traitor? Holy fuck, I knew you weren't a fair or just person, but holy fuck!"

Exposed and stunned too much to respond intelligently, Lloyd remained seated and didn't even try to impose his will on her again. "What did I tell you about vulgarity?" he asked, unable to continue discussing the topic with her.

Triumphant in their argument but too upset to continue either, Nurana continued walking out of the crevice and pacing around by herself. "I'm in the service to a mortal idiot, and now he's making me break into a secret jail to save Oblivion's biggest loser…I hate you, Rolsen. I hate you more than anything on your damned world."

She wandered off before he could recollect his thoughts and begin to respond coherently, leaving him to seethe angrily at her and at his own loss in an argument against a person who's only tactic was talking really fast and interrupting a lot.


	65. I hate you.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I hate you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate you.

For the rest of the day as the two of them continued on their way to their remote destination, there was one single sentence that Nurana repeated more than any other:

"I hate you."

They did speak, of course, over the following eight or nine hours of hiking. Obstacles had to be overcome, terrain had to be traversed, and rough areas had to be crossed. No matter how difficult their journey proved, though, and no matter how much cooperation was required of them, the same sentence was always on the tip of Nurana's tongue:

"I hate you."

There were moments of respite. At least once, they both had to stop to go to the bathroom. On multiple occasions, they both had to adjust the travel bags as items fell around inside and became uncomfortable. They switched bags, took turns carrying both, and alternated between walking slower or faster depending on their respective moods and energy levels. All the while, no matter how they were traveling or walking, Nurana couldn't help herself from directing that same sentence at Lloyd:

"I hate you."

When they stopped for a snack, she ate slowly as was her habit, savoring every bite like always. Whenever she was done chewing, however, or done sipping on water, she didn't hesitate to remind him:

"I hate you."

A few hours after they'd started walking, they paused on top of the highest ridge they'd found just to corroborate the finer details of their map. She was helpful when it came to finding their way, seeing as how she'd been complaining about sleeping on bedrolls. Still, she couldn't help herself, and at the quietest and most pleasant moment, the words still spilled from her dark violet lips:

"I hate you."

As night fell, he cast his light spell, using it to find their way in the dark. He used a low intensity version, not wanting to attract attention, but his concentration on the cast was disrupted when she couldn't hold her mouth closed for more than five minutes:

"I hate you."

He tried to ask her what she thought of the Altmer, the Dominion, the Thalmor, and high elven law enforcement in general, attempting to smooth relations with a discussion focused on their mission. She wasn't swayed, however, and was surprisingly uninterested in details which could possibly save his life and thus hers:

"I hate you."

When he offered her a piece of candy he'd been hiding in his travel bag, she refused it, only saying:

"I hate you."

Then he asked her if she thought that hating him would improve her situation, to which she responded:

"I hate you."

He told her she was responsible for her own feelings, which gave her carte blanche to say:

"I hate you."

He tried giving her the silent treatment back, but she was only encouraged and kept repeating:

"I hate you."

When he said that was fine, she replied:

"I hate you."

No matter what he did:

"I hate you."

"I hate you."

"I hate you."

And so on and so forth until they reached the remote little inn, the one in the middle of nowhere on a lonely local road, flanked only by a stable and some chicken coops. They watched the narrow road for a bit to be sure that there weren't any other patrons around, though she still whispered that she hated him in the dark as they watched. When they realized that nobody was around, they moved from the hills to approach.

"Alright, I'll do the talking," he said as they walked toward the inn. "Keep your hood low and pretend to be some hermit or shy peasant."

"I hate you," she replied.

He turned and grabbed her by the loose folds of her sleeve. "Shut up! This is part of the mission, now, so if you say that again, I'll backhand you like a loan shark collecting money," he whispered harshly, actually causing her to shrink away from him. His blood pressure boiled after hours of being denigrated by a person he was forced to ally with, yet the way she cowered from him despite her strength still gave him that confusing, inappropriate sense of guilt. "Don't talk, your voice is obviously demonic. If these local yokels call the authorities, then I'm done for, which means you're done for. Got it? Answer me!"

"Yes! Yes, I'll do what you say," she whispered back harshly, pulling away like she thought he really would have beaten her (he wouldn't have). "I promise."

"Good; now, don't you forget it. Stay behind me while I talk to the proprietors; as soon as we get the key, I'll give it to you and you go straight to the room. I'm not sure if they'll have private toilets available, so stay in the room while I check the place out. Don't let anyone see you by yourself. Understood?"

Demure and downtrodden in a way unbefitting a vicious, murdering nether-beast like her, she averted her eyes and folded her hands in front of herself defensively. "Yes sir," she replied, all defiance gone when he finally yelled. The muscles in the sides of his jaw began to ache from how tightly his jaw was clenched, and he loathed imagining how awful he looked when he was angry.

Shaking the thoughts away, he took a few deep breaths and put on his good face - his polite face, the gentleman's face, the face he wanted to believe was really his. The two of them reached the front door of the remote inn and entered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate you.


	66. They Think They Reach a Safe Haven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even an act as mundane as checking into an inn turns into an argument.

The two of them walked in to the tiny reception room of the traveler's inn, a lonely little place in a thicket far from the nearest high elven town. By the standards of more rustic people, such as the Bosmer on the mainland, the wooden building with its low ceilings and lack of décor would be considered cozy; to an urban Altmer native to the island, it would seem decrepit and unkempt. As soon as Lloyd saw the sleepy attendant behind a desk, barely awake and holding an upside-down book, he knew that he was dealing with one of Summerset's less refined examples of citizenry.

The attendant didn't even bother to smooth out his unironed clothes as the two travelers approached. Lloyd waited while the sullen Altmer stood up and stretched before speaking. "Good evening, kind sir; you know, you look the same way I feel right now," the Breton joked, trying not to overdo his smile.

His comment didn't register at first, and the attendant pulled a notepad full of shriveled pages on the counter between them. "Good evening, welcome to the Lonesome Road Inn. All food and drink in the kitchen costs extra." Without looking up, the sleepy high elf thumbed through the notepad. "All rooms are available; the rates are here."

Ignoring the notepad at first, Lloyd looked at the sleepy, introverted receptionist and smirked. "Seems like we came during the right season, then! Are there no tourists passing by at this time of year?"

Finally, the bored receptionist tilted his chin up and actually looked at the person he was speaking to. The enchantment on Nurana's robe worked perfectly, and the high elf didn't even think of her other than to note that there were two guests present. "Huh? Our guests?" the receptionist asked in confusion. After a few awkward seconds, the local man realized that someone was talking to him. "Yes, it's the off season, which is good for you. People won't start passing through for another month or so."

Lloyd looked over the rates for a brief moment. "Hmm, it's nice to have those pauses in the work year, when there's less pressure and stress, isn't it?" he asked, surprising the bored receptionist with his interest.

"I guess it is. I don't usually think of it that way. Work is work."

"Indeed, work is work, but work can also be a joy if you choose to view it that way," Lloyd replied, ignoring the way that Nurana tugged on his shirt impatiently. "When there's less business, you have time to catch up on reading, which I can see you do," he said while pointing toward the book the man clearly wasn't reading. "When there's more business, that's good for you and your family."

Flipping his book the right side up and looking a little self-conscious, the receptionist stood up straight and finally smoothed out his unkempt shirt. "You really think so?" the Altmer asked.

"I do," Lloyd replied. "If you think it and live it, then there's never any reason to be bored or unhappy at work. It's all in the mind, you see."

Nurana pulled hard on Lloyd's shirt, but the enchantment was powerful enough such that the receptionist didn't even notice the action when it was happening right in front of him. "That's a nice way to look at things, I guess." The high elf even smiled for a second, a genuine if unpracticed smile, before remembering that they were doing business at that moment. "Anyway, there's a private room for which I can give you a discount. Only ten gold coins since it's off-season; the bathing room and toilets are across the hall from it."

"Then that's what we'll take, sir; I feel comfortable here already. Lloyd promptly paid up and handed the key to Nurana, who walked around the corner such that the receptionist couldn't see her and began waving in irritation for Lloyd to follow. "It was nice to meet you. Perhaps I'll see you again if you're on duty tomorrow."

The receptionist was taken aback by the positive comments. "Really? I mean, sure, it was…nice to meet you too," the rural high elf replied awkwardly. The two of them waved before Lloyd left with Nurana, who huffed at him in frustration.

Inside of their modest one-bed room with a single dresser, she unceremoniously dumped their bags on the floor and looked at Lloyd over her shoulder dismissively. "Why don't you just go make out with him?"

"Eew, what? What's your problem?" he asked.

"Are you kidding me? Gladhanding some lonely loser whom you only need to get a room key? Are you the king of wasting time?"

"Nurana, the man looked bored and unhappy. In a matter of moments, I was able to make his evening a bit brighter at no cost to myself. It doesn't hurt to be courteous to people, especially service workers. That's a very difficult profession."

"So you lower yourself and give up your own time for a person who's only going to forget you in a day? For a sorcerer, you're not very bright, Rolsen."

"I'm bright enough to win you as a thrall and keep you under control," Lloyd replied without even thinking.

Nurana gasped and turned to him, legitimately hurt by the comment. For a split second he worried that he'd opened the door for another argument, but apparently his words had cut her deeply enough to disarm her. "Nice to hear how you really view me," she said while turning her nose up and looking away. She'd taken the comment far too personally for a person who hated him so much, but he didn't push the topic and allowed her to take a few personal items from their bags and hurry off to the bathing room before he could.

He sat alone in the room for a while, wondering how he was going to pull off a prison infiltration with such a dysfunctional helper.


	67. Secluded in an Inn Room

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning for adult themes.

Once Nurana finished bathing and freshening up, Lloyd took his turn across the hall. Any drowsiness he'd had disappeared once he reminded himself of what hot water felt like. The cramped bathing room of the inn would have been unacceptable anywhere else in Summerset, but after spending the past few days on the run from the law and his enemies, the amenities felt just fine for him. He took his time cleaning up and preparing himself to sleep, actually pushing all of his worries out of his mind for a few minutes.

Hurrying across the hall in a bath towel, he knocked on the door for Nurana to let him back in. She took her sweet time, making him wait until she pulled the door open to conceal herself lest there be anyone watching them. He stepped inside and put his clothes from the previous day on the dresser, only then realizing that there was no partition behind which he could change into acceptable sleeping garments. He turned around to see Nurana still by the door, similarly draped in nothing but a bath towel despite having been out of the bath for a long time. He immediately felt uncomfortable and struggled with his gaze despite her complete nonchalance about it.

She twirled the wineskin from his travel bag in her hand and raised an eyebrow at him. "You never told me that you had alcohol with you," she said, mildly irritated while she stared him down and took another sip.

"I, well, didn't think of it. I don't drink."

"Sure, I totally believe that," she said mockingly while pushing past him to claim the bed for herself. She sat down on the edge and leaned back on one hand, crossing her legs. "Why would you even have it if you don't use it, genius?"

"For emergencies," he replied, causing her to actually laugh at him. "I'm being serious. Wine is easier to preserve from contamination than water when traveling off of main roads. I'd rather have it and-"

"Not need it than need it and not have it," she replied in a stupid-sounding voice. "One of your many great ideas, just like breaking in to a prison of your crummy world's most elite government forces." She took another long swig and then paused to swallow, looking a bit thoughtful. "I don't want to do this," she said, the mockery gone from her voice.

"I wish we didn't have to," he replied, and she actually looked at him without derision or fear for the first time.

"Then why are we doing it, Rolsen?" she asked, suddenly looking very concerned. "There have to be other options. They might not be the ones you prefer, but an intelligent man would at least consider them."

He folded his arms over his chest and looked down. He tried to pace around, but the room was a little too small. "I don't know. I promised to get Saline restricted documents for the Thalmor; I don't think it would be wise to cross him."

She shook her head at him, letting her still-damp violet hear escape from behind one ear. "No, definitely not, but you have to be a little creative. If I know high elven cities, and I've stalked this island long enough, then there should be an outlaw's refuge outside of Shimmerene itself. I'm absolutely certain that you could buy documents from the government of these people which have already been stolen for you, and I doubt that Saline cares how you get such restricted materials. All risk to you would be removed in that case, yes or no?"

His initial desire was to deny, but his academic honesty forced him to affirm. "If such documents could be obtained, and if we had enough money, then yes, that might work. It might not - remember that, among other people, there's a group of smugglers who're also out to get me. They'd have eyes and ears in outlaws' refuges."

"In Alinor, yes. In Shimmerene, no, and you also have an advantage: everybody probably thinks it was you who set Alinor's sewers on fire and killed all of those guards. You probably have a strong reputation among criminals on this island. Congratulations on that, by the way."

"What?" he asked in confusion at her compliment. When she winked at him while taking another sip, he was only more confused; she'd spent all day insulting him and all evening arguing with him, yet she was being friendly after just a small bit of drink. "Thank you. Whatever. The point is, it's not a surefire plan."

"Neither is breaking into a secret Thalmor prison. In fact, the chances of succeeding with that plan are far less than our chances if we just go to Shimmerene and pay thieves to handle this for us."

He could feel her hopes growing, so he decided to just be direct. "I can't leave Tammaeroth behind, Nurana; you know that. There's no paying anybody else to handle that part for us."

Taking a deep breath, Nurana paused as if she were going to insult him again. Instead, she gave him a look of pity so sincere that it upset him; he really didn't want sympathy from a person he viewed as morally disgusting. The way she looked at him, though made him even feel pitiful on the inside.

“Rolsen…Lloyd…whoever…you need to be honest with yourself. This isn’t a walk in the park; you’re putting your life on the line for a fantasy. You don’t really believe that Tammaeroth was left alive by the Thalmor, of all people.”

He paused, but then felt like he was pausing for too long. “We don’t know that for sure,” he answered, nervously turning around, trying to create some sort of space in the small room to pace around.

She watched him for a moment, which only frustrated him even more. After a few seconds of the silent treatment, she scooted to the side on the bed. “Sit down. You’re annoying me and stressing yourself out.”

Though he stopped pacing, he didn’t approach the bed, uneasy about being alone with such a volatile person, in private, while both of them were wearing nothing more than wet bath towels. His discomfort increased as much as hers decreased. “I’d rather not,” he replied cautiously, though she waved away his concerns.

“Don’t act like a child. I’m asking you to sit for a reason.” She pointed to the empty spot next to her on the bed and stared at him like she was waiting to speak. He could feel pressure mounting, as if he were their sole person holding up a line at the grocery store, and he found himself sitting down next to her despite not wanting to. “You asked for my opinion about the details of the mission, right? To increase our chances of survival?”

She kept staring at him like she was on hold in life. Normally, he cared little for the unreasonable demands of others, but the cramped quarters and still night air added to the sense of pressure she was piling on. “Sure. I mean, yes.”

“Good. I didn’t offer, by the way, but since you asked, I feel it’s important to advise you. I’m seeing goals which are logical, and attainable, and goals which seem poorly considered. I may not be from Mundus, but I’ve stalked your world long enough to know a few things. Do you know what the Thalmor are like?”

The way her voice dropped when she was maintaining decorum, and the seemingly pointless question, disarmed him enough that he didn’t fully realize he needed to answer. She dug her elbow into his side, though not painfully, to grab his attention. “Yes, I do. I think most people here do. Here, as in, on Tamriel.”

“Good; this is all good to hear. You're thinking clearly. You must be aware of how ruthless the Thalmor are. Even many of us from Oblivion admire their methods. Now - and this is very important - combine what you know of them with what you know of this secret prison of theirs. Whom did you say is imprisoned there?”

“Revolutionaries and heretics,” he replied, struggling to find something to look at when she crossed her legs and let one of them hang just inches from his.

Nonchalant and unaware of his discomfort, or just unconcerned with it, she dropped the wineskin on his lap and held her hands in front of him to begin counting on her fingers. “This is what we know about the enemy, then. They’re ruthless and goal-oriented,” she said while demonstrating the points to him on her fingers as if he couldn’t count. “They hold political and religious prisoners at one location. They keep that location secret. That location, no matter how large it is, has a limit on its capacity. That limit means that they can’t hold prisoners indefinitely. Based on that, we can speculate on how they achieve inmate turnover.” She waved her hands around in front of him as if erasing a chalkboard. “Their political prisoners are likely mortals who will eventually die of old age; their religious prisoners are probably mortal and immortal. Daedra. There are two ways to achieve inmate turnover and free up space: death or parole. Are you listening to me, Lloyd?”

“I…yes,” he replied after a tense pause.

“Good, because this is important. Can I borrow that?” she asked, reaching across his arms to poke the wineskin.

Tense and trying to keep himself closed off, he unfolded his arms to see what she was actually touching. “What? Yes-“ She took it from his lap before he could, drank a sip, and then put it back instead of keeping it. In an attempt to ignore the nervous energy as well as his feeling of exposure, he tried to focus on the logistics of their mission. "Anyway, Tammaeroth has been in captivity for only four days or so, which means we really need to hurry."

"I'm not finished, Lloyd," she said while licking drops of wine off of her violet lips. "This is important. I thought you were listening to me."

"I am."

"Then hear this: Tammaeroth is loyal, according to you; you really believe that. In that case, do you think she'd confess to your whereabouts? To the exit portal near Shimmerene?"

"Never!" he replied with confidence.

"Then what reason would the Thalmor have to keep her alive?"

"They…" He tried to respond immediately, like a gut reaction, but he stuttered and choked on his own saliva. "I mean, it's clear," he stammered, his mind contorting so much that his skin broke out into goosebumps. Disarmed and stunned, he felt his blood race in his veins just imagining what the Thalmor were capable of.

What made his own dismay even more painful was the fact that Nurana didn't latch on to his weakness like she normally would. That, and the fact that she wouldn't stop giving him that sympathetic look like he were an abused dog begging for scraps. His neck stiffened with tension as he tried to think of any way to prove her wrong.

"If they kill a daedra, then they risk that vestige being reanimated in Oblivion and just coming back," he said weakly, staring down at the wineskin and his twiddling thumbs.

"Sure, if there's a mortal willing to summon them; but that's easily solved by executing the mortals," Nurana countered, using a surprisingly soft and courteous voice. "They need empty jail cells for inmate turnover. Number one. The mortals eventually need to be released or executed. Number two. And number three, the daedra won't ever be released; only executed. Holding the daedra forever would make sense if a jail had unlimited space, but no jail on your mortal plane does. Kill the conjurer, and you cut off the conjured."

Slowly, Nurana reached up to tuck one of Lloyd's long-ish blonde locks behind his ear. He instinctively leaned his head away from her, but she didn't seem to notice. "If Tammaeroth wouldn't talk, then they would've killed her already. The Thalmor aren't stupid. And I can tell you, from experience, that it takes our bodies a long time to reform in Oblivion…unless a mortal conjurer knows exactly where our animus has gone to. Do you know where her animus would go, considering the fact that her dishonored clan is no longer welcome in the Deadlands, according to my sources?"

Pressure mounted in his head, behind his eyes, and felt the muscles in his cheeks and jaw strain again. He detested the questions Nurana was asking him, and he detested himself for his inability to answer them. In a moment of weakness, he took a swig from the wineskin, if only to wash down the lump in his throat. He hadn't tasted alcohol in years, aside from a few sips at the House of Reveries, and the inside of his cheeks prickled on the first gulp. At first, he felt nothing, and he waited for a long time as he tried to think of a cogent response to refute what Nurana was suggesting.

She waited as well, watching his reaction like she actually cared. Though she did obviously care about her own survival, and that made her questioning all the more annoyingly poignant now that he'd opened the door for discussion. "Apocrypha, probably; she was given this mission by Saline." There was little conviction in his voice, and Nurana shook her head at him perceptively.

"Her markings are still red. The coloration of Dremora is the same as Scamps and Watchers; the oath to their lord can be identified by it. Unless Clan Dagon would take her back - which they won't - then her body marking means that she has no oath. She could wind up anywhere, even in a pocket realm without a lord. She could just swim in the Darkness for a few centuries. We swear oaths to bind ourselves to a lord for a reason, Lloyd…dying without a lord is even more horrific for us."

He shook his head back at her, haunted by a discussion which Tammaeroth herself had already gone through with him. Taking another sip to calm his nerves, he put his mind to work, brainstorming for any possible way Nurana could be wrong. "Maybe she'd be back in the Deadlands," he said with resignation.

"No, her oath has been broken; she can't," Nurana replied quietly. Lloyd felt his fingers trembling on the wineskin, a mixture of anger, despair, and sorrow bubbling beneath the surface of his carefully maintained composure. Nurana reached for his shaky fingers, causing him to bristle at her initially, but her grip was warm and unaggressive. "Lloyd…I'm sorry to have to explain this, but you need to hear it. I may have selfish reasons, but in the end, I still can't let you die. I don't want you to risk your life chasing a mirage; it's unnecessary risk. And I'm telling you now…there's no logical reason why the Thalmor would maintain a daedra which refuses to yield information. And in the case of this daedra we're discussing, we don't know how you'd find her again. And however you would discover that information, we know that there aren't any clues in some secret prison run by aedra worshippers."

Sighing deeply, Lloyd suppressed a nervous twitch in his hand and resisted the urge to ball it up into a fist. "What else do I have to show for all of this?" he murmured, talking to himself rather than her. "I came all this way for nothing? The mission was so easy…get to Shimmerene and she's be accepted by Hermaeus Mora…we were so close…we couldn't have failed just like that."

Confusing him even more, Nurana turned his palm over and planted a thumb on the lines. "Failure hurts, but it makes us stronger. Ignore my past and understand that, if I'm forcibly tied to you, then I have a real reason to want you to be stronger. But…" She felt the back of his neck with her other hand, pressing a finger into the tense, tightened part of the thick muscles. "…stronger doesn't require you to nearly get yourself killed. Trust me when I say that I'm being honest. You know that I don't want to end up dead myself." She let go of his hand but started to knead the strained muscles on the back of his neck. He tried to lean away, but she leaned along with him. "I'm sorry about before, by the way. It's not smart of me to try to hurt you on purpose, considering our…connection."

Staring straight down at the floor, he struggled to balance the pain of realizing that he'd failed the only person he'd had left in the world along with the comfort of receiving sympathy from someone who had no reason to do so. The room still felt cramped, maybe even more so now that he was seated, and the relaxation brought by her massaging the tension out of his neck clashed with the constriction in his lungs at the thought of having really lost someone. He took another sip from the wineskin, stressed and trying to occupy himself since he was no longer sure of what to say.

She squeezed his bicep to grab his attention. "I promise that I'll be nicer now…our situation doesn't have to be bad for either of us," she whispered, trapping him with those dark violet eyes. He felt stuck and continued staring at the floor, frozen as she leaned closely enough such that her bare leg was rubbing against his. "You can trust me…even if you lose everything else, you still have me."

Almost by accident, he turned his head to avoid the hypnotic movements of her fingers and ended up looking straight at her. Skillful with her hands, she dragged her fingers along his neck and ear to cup his cheek and leaned in faster than he'd been prepared for. She knew all the right ways to move as she pressed her lips against his, turning her head this way and that and opening her mouth just enough to entice him to take her tongue between his teeth. When he put his hands on her to push her away, her dexterity proved too much for him, and she moved directly between his arms.

"Wait…no-"

She cut his protest off with another deep kiss. Her tongue carried the flavor of cinnamon…roasted cinnamon, not cooked so much as heated, and she moaned into his mouth when he tried to refuse her again. Squeezing the meat of his deltoids, she uncrossed her legs and slid one knee onto the mattress, then leaned forward and pushed him down onto the bed. Resistance was futile. The now empty wineskin fell to the floor along with both of their bath towels.


	68. Rude Awakwning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adult theme warning.

A light headache woke Lloyd the next morning…or maybe it was another morning. He couldn't quite remember. All he knew is that, when he woke up, his deepest desire was to go back to sleep. Though his body mostly felt fine, if sore from a workout, the headache wouldn't go away. It wasn't severe enough to warrant medical attention, but it was just powerful enough to prevent him from catching more sleep. For a few minutes he just laid there, forgetting whether the wall was on the right side of the bed or the left, and wished that he and whoever he was sleeping with could just lay there for a few hours more-

His eyes shot open, salty and stinging. There was a body in his arms, pressed up against him, and his first reaction was to put them in a restraining hold in self-defense. Scooting away, he hit his back against the wooden wall and slipped off the pillow, essentially trapping himself. Movement signaled that he was being watched, and for a second, he worried that he was experiencing sleep paralysis. The fact that he could move, however, quickly reminded him that he was entirely awake. When the person next to him propped herself up on an elbow, he finally began to remember where he was.

"Sleep well?" Nurana asked, bearing her pearly teeth at him in a wolfish grin.

The haze disappeared from his mind fast due to his shock, revealing a myriad of uncomfortable images from the previous night. His skin started to crawl as his awareness fought against his headache, and his denial swept over him hard and fast.

"What's going on?" he asked needlessly, wasting his time due to self-loathing.

The way she looked at him up and down made him want to pull his own skin off, and she relished the sense of unease she was creating in him. Rising up on both arms, she loomed over him, edging closer to the point where he began to feel afraid of what she might do. He reached up and stuck his elbow in between them, desperately and senselessly trying to put space between them. His actions only encouraged her, and she pressed herself against his forearm as her eyes bore down on him like a bird of prey watching a crippled hare.

"I fucked your brains out last night," she whispered. Her tone of voice was outwardly playful, but there was a malicious inflection barely recognizable in the sound, not different from the sense of danger her figure evoked in him despite her physical beauty. She crooked her neck over his elbow and moved her mouth as close to his ear as she could, making no attempt to hide the delight she felt from making him cringe. "And it was goo-oo-ood! I'm going to have so much fun telling Tammaeroth how unfaithful you are."

They both gasped when his leg shot out in reaction. Planting his foot on her hip, he pushed her off the entire bed, shoving her onto the floor of their inn room with a deep thud. He hadn't even realized he was doing it, but his panic at how easily she tore down the defensive denial he'd set up overtook his senses. The impact of falling on the floor most assuredly hurt, but she was too busy basking in another victory to notice. She laughed and laughed, even rolling over once at his reaction. He scooted up against the wall again, wishing he could disappear.

Still laughing, she stumbled to her feet, showing no signs of hangover at all. Moving gracefully and looking content, she grabbed his bath towel from the floor and walked over to the door without even putting it on. She stood in the doorway stark naked after opening the door, displaying not a care in the world. As if she couldn't make her insincere mind game any clearer to him, she shot him an obscene gesture before leaving.

"Dipshit," she said before bumping the door closed with her bare ass. He could hear her enter the bathing room across the hall, leaving him alone to bury himself under the covers and chastise himself for the previous night.


	69. Forced to Wait

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fallout of the morning after. Some adult themes hinted at.

Uncomfortable in his own skin, Lloyd paced around for a long time. There was nothing he desired more at that moment than a hot shower in slow motion to wash all the bad feelings away, but he was trapped by Nurana's slow speed. She spent well over an hour in the bathing room and toilets, forcing him to stay in their private room and wait by himself with nothing to do. He eventually figured out that she was doing it on purpose as some sort of power play, taking revenge after he'd foiled her attempt to abort his mission with a midnight abduction over a day ago. Knowing what she was doing didn't make it any less stressful for him, though; if anything, knowing that she'd trapped him in the bedroom and was forcing him to wait without any notice made that wait even more irritating. He couldn't even read the few books on a shelf in the corner because his nerves were too frazzled by the image of her sadistic grin.

After an inordinate amount of time, she opened the door to the bathing room, pausing for another long period of time before closing it slowly. She took her sweet time in the hallway doing who knows what, forcing him put wrap her bath towel around himself and fling the door open. There she was, towel around her head and wearing only her underwear, cleaning her ear with a piece of cotton on the end of a stick. He grabbed her by the arm and yanked her inside of the room.

"Hey! I wasn't finished!"

"Shut up! People might hear you!" he whispered harshly. "What on Nirn are you thinking just standing there in the hallway without a disguise? Do you want to get us caught?"

"Alright, I heard you, you psycho," she said dismissively, and then promptly went back to cleaning her ears without saying anything.

Impatient and upset, he found himself unable to just leave and take his own bath. "What happened last night was a mistake," he said, unable to hold back anymore. "We need to rethink how we're going to travel together-"

"We both wanted it," she said, quickly but without granting him the dignity of a sideways glance.

"I wasn't finished talking," he replied, but he'd underestimated her cunning again.

"You talk entirely too much, and it's the height of cruelty that I'll spend the rest of my unfairly shortened existence listening to you."

"I haven't done anything-"

"You've done entirely too much, Rolsen," she said, no longer using his first name. "And the worst part is that you think you're innocent, like some misunderstood gentleman who happens to own a sex slave."

Under verbal assault just a few sentences into their exchange, he reeled at her casual aggression; all his training in academic debates hadn't prepared him for the likes of her. "How dare you accuse me of such perversion!"

"Uptight prudes like you are the most perverted, Rolsen. Raised by strict families and groomed to find some good girl at the Temple of Mara choir practice, yet you dream of some bad girl to come along and corrupt you so you can absolve yourself of fault for the nasty things you do."

"What's your problem-"

"My problem, my dear mortal sorcerer, is the inherent slavery in conjuration magic, in case I hadn't made that clear. You think that Saline helped you win one over on me? Then I'm going to make it really fucking costly for you. I'm going to make it hurt. I'm going to fucking ruin you. All your conservative background and small town mentality won't prepare you for the mindfuck I'm going to put you through for ever having thought you could command this daedra."

"I'm not even from a small town-"

"I'm not even from a small town," she mocked in a lisp.

Finally pushed too far, he grabbed her by the throat and slammed her against the wall. Hard. He didn't even feel himself performing the action at first, like he was watching someone else's drama unfold in a first-person view. His fingers dug into the flesh of her neck, and the shit-eating grin disappeared from her face. Blood pumping and teeth grinding, he initially reveled in the way that he could evoke fear in her so easily when he finally became angry. That sense of victory, however, quickly gave way to a sense of disgust. He wasn't an angry person, nor abusive…at least, he didn't think he was. And yet he almost found himself feeling powerful from the way he could so easily bully the shrew when she couldn't fight back.

That feeling of power made him feel sick. The speed at which his morality was slipping made him sick. He made himself feel sick.

Letting her go but keeping her pinned against the wall, she let all those negative feelings remain at the surface as he glared at her. Defiance marked her eyes for only a fleeting second before she relented and realized his limits. This time his patience for the silent treatment proved just barely sufficient to make a point, and she didn't test him any further. "The bath is still warm," she said while averting her eyes, which was the closest thing to an apology he was going to get. He backed away from her, the muscles in his face pulled tight in a frown.

"Stay here until I'm finished and DON'T come out again. Don't talk. And when I'm finished, don't make me wait at the door. Respond."

"Understood," she replied, concealing all emotion as he took his leave.

Tense like he was in the previous night, he even paced around the bathing room, walking right next to the warm, inviting water in a trance. He fought the sense that he was changing as a person, that he was losing his grasp on who he was, but his stress was too great for any amount of cogent thought. Defeated by his own thoughts, he whipped the towel against the wall just because and sank himself into the bath water. At least it was still hot, and uncontaminated, and he closed his eyes while settling in to the tub and turning his head toward the ceiling. He fell asleep within minutes despite it still being mid-morning.

Unfortunately for him, he was woken up halfway through his power nap by the sound of someone banging on the door. And it wasn't Nurana.

"I know you're in there, outsider!"


	70. Social Problems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An immigrant faces racism from locals in a system without rights.
> 
> Except in Elder Scrolls.

Rudely awakened yet again, Lloyd groaned at the interruption to his therapy bath and rubbed his eyes. "Who is it?" he asked, not even thinking about the question before asking it.

The person continued banging on the door. "I knew you were in there! Get off our property, your stay here is voided!" screeched an older Altmer gentleman whom Lloyd didn't know.

Confused and defensive at being verbally attacked by a stranger, all the relaxation he'd gained from the bath leaked out of him as if someone had pulled the plug. He stood up and dried off the best he could, but the banging wouldn't stop. "Just a minute, I need to dry off before I put my clothes on," he said, confused by the unseen stranger's anger.

"Don't tell me to wait on my own property! You foreigners have no right to change our culture!"

Under normal circumstances, Lloyd would have hurried to accommodate an upset stranger, assuming that anger directed at him was a misunderstanding he could discuss calmly. After the past twelve hours, though, he was no longer in the mood, nor was he feeling like himself, and he took his time getting dressed like Nurana had done with him. By the time he was dry enough to wear clothes - which became damp, and his hair was still dripping wet - the strange man yelling at him for no apparent reason was furious.

Lloyd opened the door to find an aged Altmer with greying hair, rather different from the receptionist from the previous night. The fellow looked downright incensed at Lloyd despite not even knowing who he was, and the lack of respect projected was intense. "You, get out! As the owner of this establishment, I order you to vacate my property immediately?"

In a moment of ire unbecoming of him, Lloyd actually curled his lip and sneered irately. "Excuse me, sir, but who exactly do you think you are?"

That only angered the plainly dressed Altmer even more. "Who am I? How dare you! You have no right to ask questions of any citizen, nebarra! I'm sending word to the police in the closest village right this instant!" As if to show his seriousness, the haughty high elf took half a step down the hall, as if demonstrating a threat. That specific threat was one which actually did frighten Lloyd, and make him even more defensive.

"What? I'm a paying customer here, you can't tell me to leave without telling me who you are!"

"Out! OUT!" the Altmer yelled while pointing down the hall. "Get out of my inn this instant! You and that wife of yours, your heinous carousing woke up my family and I last night. You foreigners disgust me, what with your wife moaning and screaming down the halls like that!"

Reminded of his shame during the previous night, Lloyd felt more and more under attack by the minute, and his usual calculating intellect was nullified by the sudden string of accusations and threats. "What? No, that's not true! She's not even my wife!" he protested, making his problem even worse.

"What! She's not your…how dare you! Prostitution is illegal, I'll not have you and your harlot sully my establishment any longer!" the indignant Altmer yelled. Right away, the man turned and strode down the hall, ignoring Lloyd entirely and leaving the Breton to follow him to the reception in an attempt at damage control. "I told you not to accept foreigners here without checking with me!" the older high elf said to the receptionist from the previous night.

Lloyd intervened, causing both high elves to appear shocked. "Hey, listen, I paid the proper rate, didn’t I?" he asked the receptionist whom he'd joked with the previous night. All of his previous politeness had been for naught, however, as the bit of cheer he'd seen was absent, and the receptionist looked just as indignant.

"I don't have any record of you actually paying," the receptionist said, glaring just as angrily and absolutely flooring Lloyd with the dishonesty.

"What in Oblivion? You can't be serious, we were standing right here!"

"Get! Out! My wife is already preparing to leave to the next village; leave now or we'll also report your harassment in addition to indecency!" the older Altmer yelled.

Blood boiling and calm intelligence expended, Lloyd actually took a step toward the older fellow, causing the grey-haired man to grimace at him furiously. "No, nobody is going anywhere until we sort this out! I paid good money last night, and it's not my fault that it wasn't recorded!"

The older high elf ignored the demand entirely and turned toward the open door behind the reception counter. "My dear, the foreigner just touched me! That's assault!"

"That's a lie!"

"Tell the police that he's going crazy!" the receptionist added.

"Well, I never! I'm leaving at once!" yelled back an unseen Altmer woman. The sound of shuffling bags worried the Breton, and he realized that he was wasting his time.

"Ma'am, don't leave yet! These two men are lying!" Lloyd yelled toward the open door.

"How dare you yell at my sister!" the receptionist yelled right back at Lloyd.

"Get out, nebarra!" the older fellow and apparent owner yelled.

A gasp from the room behind the counter caused all of them to pause. The three men froze, listening to the unseen exchange.

"Who are you?" the owner's wife said to an interloper. "What are you doing? I have no qualms with you!" she pleaded, suddenly much meeker than she'd been before. "HELP!"

The sound of sizzling, burning oil from a cooking fire mixed with the scream, and all three men ran into the back room.


	71. An Irreversible Life Decision is Made

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Desperate people are pushed by extreme circumstances.

Lloyd shoved the two other men aside and ran through the door first, finding himself in the unkempt kitchen of the inn. On the floor was a flailing Altmer woman bending over in front of a vat over a fire. She was thrashing around as glistening, boiling cooking coil spilled out of the vat and onto the floor, twisting in a disturbing manner that would be universally recognized as a person dying. Standing over her was Nurana, still wearing only her underwear, using a pair of tongs to dunk the Altmer's entire head inside the vat of burning hot oil.

"Nooooo!" the woman's husband cried, rushing past Lloyd to pull his wife out of the boiling oil. A streak of the sticky, burning substance splashed out and struck the man's clothing, causing him to fumble as he dropped his wife to the floor along with pieces of her that had melted off.

Before he could even properly mourn, Tammaeroth grabbed a steak knife from the kitchen cupboard and stabbed the man in the stomach, causing him to scream and crumple next to his wife.

"Nurana, stop!" Lloyd yelled on instinct, not thinking straight under the pressure.

Groaning hoarsely, Nurana dropped the knife but winced in Lloyd's direction. "Damnit, Rolsen, they're going to get us caught!" she yelled, coincidentally, just when the receptionist ran out of the kitchen.

Regaining a bit of his senses, Lloyd ran out of the kitchen as well and slid over the top of the reception counter. He lost his balance at the edge and fell off, hitting the ground hard. The receptionist reached the door and began to fumble with the keys, giving Lloyd enough time to stumble to the door and put the receptionist in a wrestling hold.

"I didn't want this!" Lloyd yelled while forcing the younger high elf back into the kitchen. The inn's owner was screaming at the top of his lungs, clutching his bleeding stomach and calling for help. "Shut up, shut him up!"

"Make up your mind, Rolsen!" Nurana yelled right back, and she picked the knife back up and took it to the inn owner's mouth. Lloyd didn't have enough time before he realized how the Dark Seducer had understood his instructions.

"Not like that-"

"What do you even want me to do!" Nurana exclaimed after she'd already cut the owner's tongue out.

Nauseated by the disgusting sight, Lloyd loosened his grip on the receptionist, who began to flail and struggle. "Heeeeeeeelp! Help us!" the receptionist screamed to nobody in particular. When Lloyd tried to cover the frantic man's mouth, the receptionist tried to bite his hand and then continued screaming.

Without even seeking approval, Nurana grabbed a meat cleaver and walked toward them, but Lloyd stopped her. "No! Nurana, not like this!"

"Open your fucking eyes, Rolsen! It's us or them!"

"Heeeeeelp! Divines help us!" the receptionist continued to scream.

Fallen into full panic mode, Lloyd found all of his knowledge unavailable to him, and he floundered. "Nurana, it wasn't supposed to happen like this! There has to be another way to stop them!"

"Stop acting like a kid, they're swindlers! You know that you don't have any rights on this island, stop being such a chump!"

"Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp-"

"Lloyd!" Nurana shouted, finally using his first name in a context when she wasn't trying to trick him. "You have to do it! These people are going to get us caught! There could be travelers nearby!"

"No, these were just village idiots. It wasn't supposed to end like this!" Lloyd yelled over the receptionist's incoherent screaming.

"Do it, Lloyd! Now!" Nurana hissed while rushing over to them and slipping behind him. "Don't let these racist fools send you to jail! Think about yourself before these assholes!" she whispered into his ear. She gripped his elbows from behind him, but didn't push. "Do it! Do it now!"

"Divines deliver your children from the daedra worshipper!" the receptionist screamed shrilly.

To everyone's horror, the female Altmer was not only still alive, but horrifically disfigured and began to crawl toward the door. Cracking under the pressure, Lloyd twisted the receptionist's head and broke the man's neck on his own, not needing Nurana's prompting.


	72. The Aftermath of a Murder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It doesn’t always get easier.

Lloyd stumbled down the hallway to the toilets, knocking the door open as the inside of his mouth felt like it was sweating. Nausea propelled him toward the porcelain and he vomited, throwing up all the wine from the previous night along with the remains of a biscuit he'd eaten. The effort was painful and unpleasant, and he was left shaking on the floor after he'd puked to the point of dry heaving. Gasping for air, he spent another good few minutes hanging over the toilet bowl while Nurana rummaged through the entire inn without even bothering to get dressed first.

"The windows are all clear; there's nobody within view for miles who could have heard," she said nonchalantly despite the gross amount of blood on both of her hands. In the closest gesture she could reach to sensitivity, she handed him a glass of water to rinse his mouth out. "I'll put the weapons in their hands to make it look like the husband killed his wife and brother-in-law. Then we don't even need to bury the bodies. Oh, and I'll finish killing the couple. They're still moving."

Too sick to even protest, Lloyd slumped onto the floor of the bathroom stall, and closed his eyes. His head was spinning, both from the nausea as well as moral disgust with himself. He waited for a long time before Nurana returned to wash all of the blood off of her hands.

"Done," she said once her hands were clean. She turned to look at him sitting on the floor against the wall. "What's wrong with you? I've seen you kill people, and we haven't even known each other that long. Toughen up. And please, gargle that water."

Fingers shaking, Lloyd remained slumped on the floor. "Those people didn't deserve to die," he mumbled.

She did a double take, scornful but not outright angry at him. "You're delirious from puking; you can't really believe that. They were going to get you arrested, which would mean execution once they figure out who you are. And that means permadeath for me, so no, they definitely deserved to die."

He shook his head no and made himself dizzy in the process. "They weren't raising their hands against us personally."

She sighed and stared up at the ceiling. "You've got to be kidding me." Then she crouched in front of him and folded her hands. "Their actions would have led to your death; it doesn't matter how many steps that would have taken. You or them; kill or be killed. Grow the fuck up and show some gratitude for all my help." Waiting to see if he'd react, she seemed to lose interest when he didn't, standing and walking away instead of taunting him like he'd expected. "I'm going to go raid the kitchen and storage room. I suggest you help so we can get out of here before any travelers really do come by."

She left him there on the floor, wallowing in confused guilt at killing the unarmed receptionist. He sat there for a long time before he finally rinsed his mouth out.


	73. They Try to Reach an Understanding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One of many battles of wills ensues (that’s correct grammar, by the way). It all boils down to who has a higher tolerance for annoyance.

The two of met near the front door of the inn. They'd traded out their travel bags for a pair of large backpacks with straps and appropriately raided the establishment for supplies; they'd even found a few pairs of long robes with hoods of varying colors, all the better to conceal their identities. Lloyd hung his head low and said nothing as they prepared to leave. Nurana put up a 'we're closed' sign in the window and then took the keys with them after locking up every door in the building. She stood and looked at him curiously.

"We have a long way to Shimmerene," she said, withholding all her negativity and testing his reaction.

Without a word, he turned away from her and started walking in the opposite direction, toward Alinor. She growled low in her throat when he didn't even bother arguing with her, and she tried to pull a power play at first.

"You're acting like a stubborn child!" she yelled after him, staying in place by the door. "You're not solving anything with this drama, you fucking manchild! You'll die without me to help you!"

Not even listening to her, he continued walking with his head down, taking a more efficient route back to Alinor than the one he and Tammaeroth had initially used to reach Rellenthil. Somber and shocked at the morning's events, he'd lost all desire to argue. Nurana cried out in frustration, her power play failing miserably, and ran after him.

"What do you think you're going to do, you idiot? An incompetent dumbass like you won't survive a day in the wilderness without me! You need me, knock it off with whatever point you're trying to prove!"

"I order you to go your separate way from me," he said flatly, shocking her into silence long enough for distance to open between them. She had to run to catch up with him again, but she already started to groan in pain from her defiance at his binding order.

"You're fucking nuts! I can't let you out of my sight - you're too stupid to take care of yourself!"

"Fate will play out no matter what we do," he replied, not even bothering to look at her. "Now leave me."

Grunting as the ritual binding magic stung her, she stopped following him, jerking like a malfunctioning Factotum as she tried to resist. "No! Lloyd! You can't do this! It's already bad enough that my life will be unnaturally ended because of you. Don't speed that process up! You're afraid to die! This is just shellshock talking!" He didn't answer, and she turned apoplectic when she realized that he was being serious. "Please, I'll go with you! I'll help you get to the crucible whatever! Let me come!"

"Whatever," he mumbled, causing her to double over and gasp as the magical block on her actions was lifted.

"Shit!" she panted, bracing her hands on her knees as she caught her breath. He didn't stop walking, though, and she hurried after him once she was able. "You need to slow down, you're not thinking straight!"

"Either help me or don't."

"Lloyd," she said, using his first name again, "stop and think. You know that Tammaeroth is probably dead, and you're going to get yourself killed for nothing!"

"Help or don't; make your choice."

"I'll help you by getting you to this portal and off the island. I'll keep you safe and alive in Oblivion - I promise you. Just turn around and stop this ridiculous game!"

"Leave me alone," he said nonchalantly, sending a second wave of painful conjuration resistance running up her spine.

"No! You can't do this to me!" she screeched while her body began to twitch and jerk in place for a second time. "You'll die alone - that's the same as condemning me, an immortal being, to permanent death! How can you be so cruel?"

That word, in particular, grabbed his attention and replaced a measure of his guilty with rage. "Cruel?" he asked with a deep-creased scowl while turning back to her. "You think I'm cruel for leading you to permanent death?" He walked over to her and grabbed her by the arm, shaking her. "You abduct mortals to transform into soul shriven! You murder innocent people! You worship the prince of plots! Nothing is too cruel for you!"

He threw her to the ground, venting pent up anger at both her and himself. "You even tried to kill Tammaeroth, and now you want to leave her to die! You care about nothing except for yourself in the entire universe! You don't know what cruelty means!"

The two of them stared at each other there, in the lightly wooded hills, breathing heavily after his voice had finished echoing. That sense of loathing entered his mind again when he realized how much he'd been yelling for the past few days; he never liked to yell at anybody or anything. Scared by the feeling that his identity was being lost, he turned away from her and started to walk again, shaking with aimless anger. She stood up.

"I'll support your decision-"

"You're lying," he said, interrupting her instead of the other way around for the first time.

"I'm bound to you; I'm not able to lie!" she protested with desperation in her voice. The sound was unnatural for her, like a princess who was tasting disappointment for the first time. "You're a conjurer, you know that. I can lie to other people, but not to you! I'll do what you say! I swear!"

"Fine," he murmured too quietly for her to hear. When the ritual no longer forced her to stay away from him, she knew what he'd said and stumbled after him again.

"No more," she gasped while catching up to him. "I'm not your enemy anymore, Lloyd; please don't do that to me again. It hurts more than a mortal can understand."

"I don't care."

"What happened, Lloyd? You've killed people before; I knew it the moment I saw you hack our cultist to death with a hatchet in the Alinor sewers. What's the big deal about this time? Why are you taking this all out on me?"

Once again stunned by her self-centered nature, he stopped in front of her and stared her down. All the defiance and cunning, sharp-tongued insults she'd pelted him with were conspicuously absent. "My very first job was as a member of the Daggerfall city guard. I didn't like it, and I took a different path, but that's how I got my start; as a lawman. That's my earliest beginning in the world of adults. Through no fault of my own, I'm being chased by lawmen here like a common criminal, and I've now been put in situations by other people which have forced me actually to break laws. Never have I been a criminal, not in my life, but what you did this morning…what you did destroys the sense of ethics I once held at the core of my person. You escalated a situation and forced me to murder a person who hadn't raised a hand against me; now I'm a killer. Just like you."

He began to turn away from her, giving her a look of contempt which he'd never given anything in his life, feeling a foreign sense of bitterness overtake him for the first time since ever. "Congratulations; you're corrupting a person who didn't do anything to provoke you at the beginning of all of this. So don't ever expect me to pity you for your impending death, when your animus will disintegrate into nothingness and cease to exist," he said, deriving a measure of grim satisfaction at the dread he saw on her face. He got on his way to Alinor again without delay.

"I was only protecting you from harm," she said as she followed him.

"You hate me; you made that abundantly clear yesterday. You only protect me to protect yourself."

"That's not entirely true anymore," she said, suddenly much less combative.

"You're lying."

"I can't lie to you, didn't you listen? When Saline first did this, I only wanted to save myself." She paused and waited for him to ask 'what about now,' but he didn't dignify her claims with a response. "You know about my race, right? Dark Seducers?"

"I'm a research scholar on connections between Mundus and Oblivion," he replied, slightly offended by the question.

"Then you know that we're well-known for our shifting loyalties. You must understand this."

"Yes, I can see that you betrayed Sheogorath for Molag Bal, of all people," Lloyd said, acting dismissively and disrespectfully in a way he couldn't ever remember doing.

"Eew, I never served Sheogorath! Most Seducers served Nocturnal in the beginning. Then I served Mephala around the time that Dunmer started following her. Then I switched to Azura because I was going through a weird phase, and then I switched to Molag Bal to spite her."

"Congratulations, you have no loyalty," he mumbled.

"That's not true! Don't tell me about loyalty when you're defending Tammaeroth! I never betrayed any prince outright, I just switched alliances, and at a much slower rate than you mortals do. This is what I'm trying to tell you. Seducers can switch sides because we don't fight the inevitable. Saline got the better of me, and Apocrypha has some interest in you, however misguided. I know when to fight, and when to accept change."

"You may not be lying, but you could be delusional," he replied in sincere disbelief. "You literally spent a few hours telling me how much you hate me yesterday. You swore this very morning that your goal is to ruin me."

"I was saying that because I was mad that you succeeded in forcing me to serve you! People say mean things when they’re mad and can’t get revenge,” she said, though she shrank when he glared at her. "That was also before I saw you do what had to be done with those racist jackasses, even if you're way too upset about it. And it was before you showed me that you're serious enough to risk your own life and send me away if you're determined to do something. Daedra respect strong willpower, you know that!"

He did at least give her a glance again. Her words were logical and obviously true in her mind, though they seemed entirely too rushed. "You're fickle and shallow to change your mind so quickly and easily. Even if you're changing your mind to support me, you're switching sides even more quickly than a mortal would."

She looked back at him, and when he saw the residual resentment in her eyes, he knew she really was telling the truth. "What choice do I have? You've marked me with Hermaeus Mora's stench of aged, crumbling paperback books. Returning to Coldharbour, at this point, would probably see me treated as a traitor. I won't fight the inevitable."

Despite knowing that she couldn't lie, he still regarded her suspiciously. A person who could go from hating him to (reluctantly) supporting him in less than a day was either stupidly shallow or so bipolar that they couldn't be relied upon. Or maybe a little of both. He didn't reply and left her to mend her bruised ego while he continued to internally chastise his own.


	74. An Awkward Truce via Ill-timed Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The pair gradually learns how to exist in the general vicinity of each other.

Nurana had left him alone for the better part of the day, remaining silent for most of the morning. Lloyd stayed quiet because it was easier to conserve energy when breathing rather than talking; Nurana stayed quiet because she was still resentful of her predicament. Well before lunch, however, she began to pester him.

“Why is your last name Rolsen?” she asked out of nowhere.

Still upset and perplexed by his own changing behavior during the past day, he was slow to answer. “What’s that?”

“Why is your last name Rolsen?”

He scowled at her and wondered what sort of game she was playing before deciding that he didn’t care. “Because it is,” he replied curtly.

“Oh.” She nodded and looked down, but even when she fell quiet momentarily, she wakes faster until they were side by side. “But you’re a Breton.”

He sighed. “What’s your point,” he asked, already mentally weary from dealing with her.

“Rolsen is a Nord name. Like, very ethnically Nord.”

“Bretons are a mixed people. We’re only united in culture, not blood or appearance.”

“But your family must be a bunch of very short Nords, then. That name could only be found in Skyrim.”

“Just like Seducers only serve Sheogorath?” he asked pointedly, even surprising himself with how acidic his question had sounded out loud.

Her eyebrows arched angrily at him, but she didn’t become overtly aggressive quite yet. “You’re just a short Nord with an accent, not a tall Breton. You don’t seem to have a clear idea of who you are.”

“My family is predominantly Nedic and Aldmer. We have only a single male Nord ancestor maybe a thousand years ago, and that’s it. You should ask before assuming things.”

“Elves are desperate to claim Aldmeri descent because they’re even more desperate to claim Aedric descent,” she countered. “Your family probably has a different background than you think.”

“You know, I don’t recall asking you for your opinion.”

She frowned at him, but remained uncharacteristically passive. “I’m only trying to pass the time,” she protested.

“Yes, well you’re patronizing and brusque whenever you speak, so unless it’s an emergency, I’m not interested in hearing it.”

“And you think you aren’t cruel,” she muttered under her breath.

“What was that?” he asked, turning to look at her and finding her truly unaggressive in her demeanor.

“You’re wrong if you still think you aren’t cruel.”

His anger was already beginning to rise. “Do you really want to go there?” he asked.

“I do. I’m cursed to stay with you for all of my unfairly shortened existence. You can’t justly keep me quiet for however long that will be.”

“I never tried to keep you quiet,” he said, making her shrink away when he started to slow down in his pace. “I’ve let you say things to me, to treat me in a way, to speak to me in a manner that I wouldn’t allow for a person who could freely disobey me. If any person on the street ever cussed at me the way you do, I’d punch their lights out. If any person told me that they hated me for six hours nonstop, I’d leave them to starve in the wilderness. You have absolutely no idea what cruelty means for mortals if you think I’m being mean to you. Keep pushing me, and I’ll show you…”

He stopped himself, uncomfortable in his skin again when he listened to his own words. Every time he felt fed up, he started to lose his grip on who he was; experiencing such a crisis in front of her, of all people, didn’t help.

“You pause when you feel you’re going too far,” she said casually. Her assessment was so fast, and so deep, that he felt naked in front of her.

“Congratulations,” he replied, burning with ire.

“You think I enjoy this?” she asked. “You might not command me to stay silent with magic, but you shut me up every time I try to speak. Swear by whatever you believe in, my behavior has changed over the past day. Yes or no?”

“Don’t presume to question me.”

“We both know the answer. I haven’t done any of the things you’re talking about for a while.”

“Because you’re manic depressive,” he replied.

“No, because I accept the inevitable, even if it’s hard. But I’m trying; that’s why I’m different. And I don’t want you to intimidate me, curse me, yell at me, or bully me for the rest of our life together every time I speak. If I must change my behavior to make that happen, then I will; my loyalty to daedric princes has shifted enough times. I can adapt to you like I did to them.”

Despite his rapidly degenerating manners and increasingly negative outlook, she dared to tug on his sleeve so he’d actually look at her.

“I don’t want to spend the rest of my life being treated like a skullery maid. I don’t want to be a loser. I’ll be cordial if that’s what it takes for you to stop hating me.”

For a few seconds, he allowed her to hold on before pulling his arm away. Wary of how standoffish he was becoming, he felt doubt creep into his mind. As much as he detested any person who could have followed Molag Bal, even a daedra, he feared that he may have been changing for the worse in how far he was going in spurning her. He didn’t know what to believe anymore.

“I’m not the one who brought up the idea of hating each other,” he told her as a token ray of hope rather than giving her the silent treatment. He sped up his pace in the direction of Alinor, not wanting to speak again for a while.


	75. Reaching Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cumulative baggage piling up can get in the way of making amends.

The two of them ate a late lunch under a tree. Nurana had sat next to Lloyd, but he turned so he was facing away from her, looking deeper into the lightly wooded hills northeast of Alinor. He was unable to focus due to the stress he felt pressing outward from within his skull, yet he wanted to focus to take his mind off of their unlikely chances of success. His reprieve from his own thoughts came to him through an unwelcome blessing…or perhaps a welcome curse. He wasn’t sure anymore.

“Where are you from?” Nurana asked spontaneously. He continued eating the beans they’d heated in a clay bowl. “Where are you from?” she asked again. He hummed as he ate in an attempt to signal to her that he was busy eating. “Where are you from?”

“I heard you,” he replied while still chewing.

She watched him eat and waited. “Where are you from?” she asked as soon as he finished the bite in his mouth.

“High Rock, now let me finish eating.”

Just as he was about to raise a spoonful to his mouth again, she struck. “Where in High Rock?” she asked.

“A place,” he answered.

“Which place?”

“With people.”

“Where exactly?”

“Why do you care?”

“I’m trying to pass the time.”

“Pass it by yourself,” he replied gruffly, and then he continued eating.

“Talk to me, I’m so bored!” she whined.

“I’m eating. Leave me alone.”

Scrunching her nose up angrily, she looked down at his empty bowl. “You’re finished after this bite.” When he didn’t reply, she huffed and turned away from him. “Well, I’m from Evergloam. That’s where I coalesced in the beginning.” He peered at her peripherally, his sorcerer’s brain lured when she hinted at the nature of Oblivion. “Few mortals will ever know how that works. We don’t tell your kind about our planes of existence.”

“Tammaeroth told me everything,” he replied once he’d finished eating.

Nurana frowned at him again. “Impossible.”

“Very possible. Plus, I interviewed a Xivilai for a study project about five years ago. Their egos are easily stroked when a summoner treats them like a celebrity guest. They’re also easy to get talking with reverse psychology.” He stopped himself, noting how a measure of his stress was gone, even realizing that his mind had moved away from his worries, but disappointed that he’d let Nurana trick him into talking to easily. She scooted around to listen more closely.

“Tell me their name. Was it the Sojourner?”

“No, not him, and that’s the only hint you get. I’ll never tell.”

“What did they tell you?” she asked intently.

“Not as much as Tammaeroth, but enough. Enough such that I won’t be impressed by your story about the Evergloam,” he replied, causing her to snort in offense. “Not as impressed as I would be by knowing why you willingly chose to leave Azura, one of the good daedra, to serve Molag Bal.”

“I told you, I needed to spite Azura,” Nurana replied curtly.

“You really hated the Mother of the Rose so much that you were willing to follow evil incarnate?”

“Vaermina is evil incarnate; you should be just in your criticism of Molag Bal.” She scrunched her nose again when he snorted. “I’m being serious. Trust me, I know more about the princes than you do. Molag Bal protects his servants, unlike Boethiah. I’d never serve Boethiah.”

“Boethiah is one of the good daedra.”

“Oh, are you a dark elf now? Is that another part of your fake identity, Rolsen?” she asked in a faked Nord accent.

“I’m a Breton from Daggerfall; I literally have only a single Nord ancestor. You only sound ignorant when you say stuff like that.”

“And you don’t when you assume that I ever served Sheogorath? Or that I must be evil because I served Molag Bal?”

“You must have truly been jealous of Azura,” he replied, causing her to growl at him audibly. “She’s one of the good daedra, but also the prince of vanity. Maybe that’s why you couldn’t stand her in the end, huh? You couldn’t stand to be around someone as vain as you?”

“Shut up!” Nurana replied, defiance in her voice again.

“You told me you hate losing. So is that why you chose to follow Molag Bal? If you can’t win, then enslave everyone in chains until they have no choice to let you win?”

“You don’t know me!” she screeched, tossing her clay bowl roughly enough for it to break on the ground. She stormed off, but there wasn’t anywhere to go on the woodland hilltops, so she sat away from him on the other side of the tree. “I was just trying to reach out!” she shouted, her voice to shrill that it gave out in the end.

She faced away from him, leaving him alone again. Now, Lloyd had peace and quiet, but he felt empty inside. He continued to replay the conversation in his head, wondering who the person speaking with his voice was. He could never remember verbally tormenting another person so much that they walked away from him; not once. The two of them continued sitting there in silence for a long time.


	76. They Almost Reach an Understanding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Circumstance can force divergent personalities together. They must choose to get along or not.

The two of them pored over the map at the campfire they’d set up that early evening. They’d stopped their trek early, deciding to wait a good distance away from their destination to get extra sleep and wake up early. Nurana was rather subdued while they made their final plans.

“So this crucible place, right here…we can scout it at dawn tomorrow. I think we’ve reached the limit of our planning capabilities now; there’s very little else we can account for until we scout the location directly.”

“Okay,” Nurana replied flatly. She displayed no emotion when Lloyd put the map away, merely sitting on a log they’d rolled next to the campfire.

He tidied up the campsite and sat down next to her. A lot floated through his mind, very little of it making sense. Knowing the horrible things she was capable of, and guessing the horrible things she’d likely done to people in the past, he thought that he should feel little sympathy for her and spare her no comforts, like he would with a summoned Scamp or Xivkyn. Observing how her behavior changed for the better so rapidly, though, he felt a measure of guilt for stifling her attempts to reconcile.

“Hey,” he said quietly, though she heard him well. “I’m sorry if I haven’t responded to you…trying to just get along. I’ll be more thoughtful in the future.”

Resentful but certainly not shy, she turned her nose up and tried to look dignified. “I accept your apology,” she said, peeking over at him for a few seconds. “You said many hurtful things to me.”

“I’m sorry for that. I hope that you’re also sorry for trying to kill me.”

She glared at him, defensive until she listened to what he was saying. “I…apologize…for…trying…to…stab you,” she grinned out between her teeth with a great measure of difficulty. “But you wouldn’t have died. You would have lived on as a Soul Shriven. It’s not that bad.”

“Are you apologizing?” he asked pointedly.

“I…yes, I said sorry! I said it! I’m just telling you, it’s not that bad. Molag Bal would have been a better leader for Nirn than your own current leaders. Plus, Soul Shriven are better off than all the mortal peasants toiling in fields and then dying permanently; Soul Shriven come back like we do. Maybe you don’t like it, but you shouldn’t take it that personally. If I could go back, I would have converted you to our cause instead of treating you like prey once I realized how strong-willed you are.”

“You-“

“See? I just gave you a complement.”

“Nurana,” he said, causing her to fall silent. “An apology doesn’t require a justification.”

Nose upturned but stubbornness broken after days of interaction, she actually nodded. “Okay,” she sighed demurely. “Let’s leave it at that, then.”

“Very well.” They both stared at the campfire twiddling their thumbs; if they weren’t arguing, then neither of them knew exactly how to regard each other. “Was it worth it? When you lived in Coldharbour?” he asked. She didn’t even hesitate to answer.

“Of course it was. A Dominion soldier finds their choices as worthwhile as a Covenant soldier. I was satisfied with mine. Coldharbour is the size of Nirn, if a little more barren, and Molag Bal fills it with daedra, as opposed to Boethiah who relies more on mortals. I never ran out of travels, journeys, friends, alliances, foes, rivalries…Coldharbour was my life.” She took a deep breath and stared at the campfire wistfully. “You say you’re a Breton, maybe a citizen of Daggerfall. A citizen of Mournhold is your political enemy, but they feel the same pride for their people that you do; you're just on different sides. That’s what I felt in Coldharbour: we had full lives, no matter how alien it seems to mortals. You don’t like us because we kidnap you, but that’s no different from your own political factions. We just happen to win.”

“You didn’t win, though; Meridia defeated Molag Bal, along with the Companions. I met the Vestige once, and briefly asked about the invasion of Coldharbour - I know how it happened.” Nurana shook her head in disappointment at his mention of the Vestige, prompting Lloyd to continue. “Speaking of which…I was told that Molag Bal won’t reform for a long time. Why were you and that Mr. Doom fellow after me? What’s the point if Coldharbour has no active leader and the Planemeld is no more?”

“Because it’s chaos, even for daedra,” she replied. “Understand the gravity of my words; you mortals already falsely stereotype us as being purely chaotic. Well, whether that’s right or wrong, I’m from there, and I’m telling you it’s anarchy to a level we can’t tolerate. Old rules of conduct are being thrown out, and the Foolkillers Clan of Dremora led by that conniving little twerp Lyranth are treating all of Coldharbour the way the rest of us treat Soul Shriven. Mr. Doom, as you call him, had an idea to replenish the southern plains with Soul Shriven to rebuild underground. We needed cheap labor, and he knew that I’m one of the few Seducers who keeps her word. I was part of a team of over a hundred of us. We had a real vision…” Her voice trailed off a she stared into the campfire, an almost childlike disappointment in her eyes. “Our every effort has failed until now. Our only mortal cultists were mental patients and simpletons who understood little of hierarchy and domination anyway.”

“Maybe domination isn’t for you, then,” Lloyd said softly. She didn’t seem to like what he’d said, but he latched on to the point. “Maybe the Master of the Tides of Fate has been sending you a message. Not liking Azura is okay, but that doesn’t mean that Molag Bal was the right choice. Didn’t you say you don’t enjoy losing?”

“I don’t lose!” she replied hastily, rethinking her statement when he turned his head in her direction. “On my own. I don’t lose on my own. If I’m on a losing side, it’s because of the people I’m with.”

“Then maybe you need to reconsider your loyalty. Molag Bal is a dominator who can’t dominate anything beyond his own realm. He tried to drag pieces of this realm into his, and he failed. There are other princes, other beings from who you could seek protection, who either stay within their means or have the means to stretch beyond their own planes of existence.”

She snorted. “Like the Gardener of Men? Which, by the way, is the lamest nickname ever.” She turned to the side to face him again. “So why do you follow the Old Antecedent? High Rock is supposedly the territory of Aedra-worshipping plebeians.”

“I don’t follow or worship anything. I left Daggerfall to study magic without my parents interfering, and a seeker of knowledge apparently has a daedric patron. That’s it.”

“Bull…” She almost cussed again but stopped herself short. “Bretons respect magic users; that’s known about your culture.”

“Well, not my parents.”

“So you really are a Nord.”

“Do I look or smell like a Nord?” he asked rhetorically.

“No, but Nords are suspicious of magic, and your family apparently didn’t appreciate you studying magic.”

“Yes! They didn’t support me!” he replied, more defensively than he would have liked. As if Nurana were unable to resist, she latched on to that point the way he’d latched on to her point about not losing.

“Okay, so you say. But a respect for magic is so well-known about Breton culture that we’ve even heard of it in Coldharbour. So either you’re lying about your roots and your relatives are a bunch of superstitious Skyrim serfs, or you’re lying about your family because you were going through some sort of a phase and now you have a complex.”

He made a recalcitrant face that even he felt was weird, and he completely failed to give her a coherent response.

“Tell me I’m wrong,” she said. “Or just tell me the truth. You probably want to but just never know who you can trust.”

“And I’m supposed to trust you?” he asked, exasperated and no longer able to argue.

“Of course you are. I’m not able to betray you even if I wanted, and if you’d cut the shit and admit why you’re really wasting your tragically short life on an island where you have no friends or family, then I might decide I wouldn’t even want to betray you anyway. You have to think win-win about arrangements like ours.” He folded his hands but tightened his fingers stiffly enough to leave imprints with his fingernails. “I think you had personality conflict with your family. You seem like the type.”

“Maybe,” he replied while trying not to remember.

“I had a lot of conflict when I followed Azura. Close relations can be tough.” When he looked at her suspiciously, she didn’t cast her eyes away. “You and I are partnered together. I can’t waste my time hating you if this is all I have, so you don’t need to look at me like I’m trying to trick you again.”

“Fine,” he said, feeling old wounds itch when she was no longer actively insulting him. “My family are Bretons and they respect magic. I tell people they didn’t, and I even told Tammaeroth that, but they were okay with me studying magic. They just didn’t want me to leave Glenumbra to do so, and I wanted to get the hell out of the only city I’d lived in. I wanted more. Studying magic or not was never the problem, but it’s easier to tell people that.”

“But it’s not true, and I guessed it wasn’t. Honestly, the truth is easier to understand. You seem a little less like an overly ambitious, self-important asshat and a little more relatable now,” Nurana said, nonchalant about comparing him to a hat of ass. “And if you were really wondering, yes, I have high self esteem and make no apologies for it. Azura is the master of ego, and she makes it clear to her minions that there’s only room for one ego in her realm. Imagine living with parents like yours, but multiply that by a few centuries. So there…you and I are both uncouth, self-imposed exiles who dreamed of more.”

Slowly, she rose, adding nothing else as she walked over to the backpacks they’d stolen. Lloyd watched her like a hawk as she did so, ever suspicious of her motives. “What are you doing?” he asked while she fiddled with the ropes tying the backpacks closed.

“Just getting one of the water flasks out for us. No more tricks; I promise.” She sat down next to him again and drank first before offering it to him. “You really pissed me off when you foiled my plans to abduct you; I’m not stupid enough to claim that I wasn’t, and I know you wouldn’t believe that. So I have to adapt to my circumstances. I’m going to follow you whether I agree with your plans or not, try not to let you get killed, and then spend the rest of our life watching you and Tammaeroth canoodle by the campfire, assuming she isn’t already dead and lost to Oblivion. And then…” Nurana paused for a second, sincerely depressed. “…and then you’ll get old and die. And then I’ll die, follow you into Aetherius, and my animus will be destroyed forever. Just an unwanted, unloved, discarded bit of ash blown in ethereal winds.”

She frowned deeply, but it was more of a hopeless frown than an attempt to garner sympathy. “I don’t have the energy to keep fighting or manipulating you. Let’s just be cordial,” she sighed.

He accepted the water flask and took a sip, watching her settle down on the log next to him. His conflict over her resurfaced, and he found himself unable to reconcile his loathing for her previous actions and his empathy at watching that little spark of hope fade in her. The logical part of his brain dictated that he leave her to wallow in what she deserved, but the old part of him, the kinder part, the part he was trying to believe was his original self, was actually pushing him to go easy on a person who’d literally tried to sacrifice him to a false god a few days ago. He stopped trying to find a neat, easy reconciliation and resigned himself to the sort of behavioral contradictions he’d normally reject.

“We can be more than cordial. I don’t want you to feel condemned to an unfair existence if you really do want to stop hating each other. You also misunderstand why we’re going back for Tammaeroth. The bottom line is loyalty, which she showed to me when nobody else would. I wouldn’t leave behind anyone who stood by me. If you help me facilitate than, I mean if you really try, then you’ll find that what Saline has arranged isn’t so bad. It will probably be better than what you had in Coldharbour since, under this arrangement, you won’t be abducting innocent people.”

She didn’t believe him; that much was clear from the look on her face. She did look like she wished she could believe him, though, which was a start. “Maybe,” she replied, echoing his earlier response to her.


	77. The Calm Before Another Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the most civil they’ve been to each other.

On the next morning, they ate breakfast mostly in silence. An initial awkwardness hung in the air as they both tested the waters with each other. If they weren’t arguing or insulting each other, then they were both unsure of what to say. This was new territory for them both.

Bread and cheese was the first to be eaten due to Nurana’s fear of Nirn’s climate rotting food faster than she was used to. Lloyd had no idea what she was talking about, but he obliged.

She looked across the embers of their former campfire. Resolution and fatigue mixed into her demeanor. “Is there anything I can say or do to convince you to turn around right now and go back to this exit portal in Shimmerene?” she asked. The same dull hopelessness flickered in her eyes, and he tried to let her down easily.

“No…but I promise that we’ll do this as safely as possible. If you advise me that any action or movement is too risky compared to another course of action, we’ll wait for the right time.”

She savored the odorous cheese she’d been eating as if it would be her last meal. He wondered if it would be for the both of them.


	78. A Convenient Intruder Intrudes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The hardest part of infiltration is all of it.

Not long after dawn, the two of them hid in the bushes less than a quarter of a mile from their location. Using the map, they found the so-called crucible rather easily. Tucked away in an artificial clearing resulting from deforestation, the place truly did look like an abandoned warehouse…but in the middle of the woods. They didn’t need to think twice about whether they’d found the right place or not.

Lloyd hid their supplies under an armful of underbrush while Nurana watched the entrance of the building. “It’s been an hour, and I’ve only seen a single guard exit and re-enter,” she murmured. “They’re most likely relying on magical traps placed on the ground around the perimeter.”

“I can handle those. I can generally absorb most spells thrown at me. If I’m expecting it, then I can always absorb them.”

She shook her head. “Even if you’re not hurt, a fire rune may cause noise. We’d alert them to the presence of intruders.” She turned around to glance at him. “Can you at least detect the runes so we can move around them?”

“Yyyy…Yes,” he said with minimal confidence, causing her to raise an eyebrow. “I mean, I can feel them, but I can’t see them if they hide the runes under debris or in physical traps.”

“Then you’re going in front. We need a backup plan, too. The Thalmor likely have decent magical defenses, so we need to get up close and personal to take them out.”

“I agree,” he said, though she raised both eyebrows this time.

“I wasn’t asking for your input, Lloyd. You’re an infant compared to my experience; I’m just telling you what I need you to do. I’m your protector here, so don’t contradict me.”

“Oh…yes, I understand.”

“Good. Now, in the event that we do fail to sneak in, then we need a backup plan. I suggest that we switch places in such a case; I can’t risk you being grievously injured. You can focus on healing me-“

She cut her sentence off abruptly to leap past him, causing him to scoot back defensively. A scuffle broke out behind him, and he turned to find a Thalmor spy, well, spying on them. Nurana grabbed the man by the throat to prevent him from crying out, but she suffered a slicing wound from a short sword as a result. Lloyd grabbed the stealthy high elf’s arm and took the blade, hitting the other man over the head with the hilt until he fell. Nurana stomped on the spy’s neck for a quiet kill, leaving the two of them paranoid and glancing around in the bushes.

“What the hell…where did that guy come from?” Lloyd breathed out.

Feral and agitated, Nurana looked all around while still clutching the folds of the spy’s cloak. “I don’t know, but this area is patrolled.” She turned to Lloyd frantically. “Change of plan - switch clothes with this guy now. Do exactly as I say and we might still get inside without being swarmed!”


	79. Intruder Alert

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nobody said breaking into prison would be easier than breaking out of it.

Nervous to the point of shaking, Lloyd pulled the hood of the Thalmor spy down as he approached the front door of the crucible. The place looked so much like an abandoned warehouse that even the front door was rickety, though the obvious problem of why a warehouse would have been built in the middle of nowhere made the place feel unnatural. He shuddered as he walked through the moldy double doors and found himself in a neglected, curiously empty foyer. Another door sat closed across from him, but two Thalmor guards immediately noticed that he seemed lost. The older of the two approached him, eyeing him suspiciously and holding him in place with a disapproving gaze.

“This isn’t the end of your shift, Private,” the older Thalmor said, standing close enough to Lloyd to appear confrontational. When the grey-haired Altmer skeptically looked the hooded figure up and down and obviously wondered about the supposed spy’s suddenly reduced height, Lloyd nearly panicked and spoke out loud. “Name, rank, and serial number, private,” the aging Thalmor guard demanded.

Before Lloyd could speak and thus blow his cover, Nurana slipped in through the front doors of the dusty foyer. The younger guard couldn’t even scream before Nurana slit his throat, but the sound of armor clinking grabbed the older guard’s attention. Lloyd sprang forward and took the older gentleman down hard, body slamming the man like he would with an unruly drunk in a Daggerfall ghetto. Still unused to killing a stranger, even one who was purely hostile, Lloyd merely dropped an elbow onto the older guard’s forehead to knock him out. As soon as he stood up, though, Nurana stabbed the unconscious older guard to death, glaring at Lloyd as she wiped her dagger off on the man’s armor.

“Damnit, Lloyd, don’t hold back now. This is kill or be killed!” she whispered at him harshly.

“I…I’m sorry,” he sighed. “I’m trying.”

She shook her head at him, but withheld from further arguing given their dire situation. “It gets easier, I promise,” she said. “Now, we have to figure out where we’re going. I’ll peek through to the next room. Hide those bodies behind…shit, there’s nothing in here. Just try not to make any noise.”

“Alright.”

Creeping quickly bit silently, she pried the next door open ever so slowly with her fingertips and peeked inside. Without giving him time to prepare, she made a clicking noise with her teeth and then hurried away.

“Push those bodies against the wall!” she whispered urgently. “To the sides of this door, now!”

She dragged one while Lloyd dragged the other, though her sense of urgency stressed him out. “Why? What’s happen-“

“Three of them, all armed. We each take one out, but leave the risks to me! We’re in the thick of it now!”

Not a second later, the doors opened up, and three uptight, displeased Thalmor guards entered, immediately frowning when they didn’t see anybody directly in front of them in the foyer. The one in the middle tried to speak, but Nurana struck too quickly, slashing the throat of the guard closest to her.

“What!” the guard in the middle gasped, taken aback by the sudden movement.

Lloyd tried to slash the guard closest to him, but to his horror, his short sword pierced deep into the man’s face, not ending his life but horrible maiming him. The guard screamed until Lloyd slammed him against the wall. The sword was so deep into the man’s skull that he had to pull hard to get it out, nauseating him as he saw parts of facial anatomy he’d never wished to see. The guard fell to the ground, clutching his face and revealing that the last surviving guard, the one in the middle, had cut open a gash across Nurana’s upper arm and was winning in a shoving match for control of the elven sword.

Leaping over the guard Nurana had killed first, Lloyd grabbed the middle guard from behind, allowing her to wrest the sword from his control and execute the man while he was still standing. Her arm was bleeding badly.

“Wait, let me help you-“

“Damnit!” she hissed when the guard Lloyd had horrifically stabbed started to scream again. She finished the job for him but cussed at him again as she bled. “I’m fucking serious Lloyd, clean up your act!”

“I’m sorry, it won’t happen again, just hold still,” he replied.

She was fidgeting like a wounded animal, almost resisting his healing spell until the wound on her arm closed. He needed a good few minutes to pull it off, and by the time she was better, two more guards who’d heard the commotion entered. One of them reached for a whistle hanging from a string around his neck.

“No!” Lloyd gasped at the armored guard, throwing a fireball directly at the man’s head on instinct.

The guard’s magical armor helped him to partially resist the magic, but the flames certainly hurt and even warped the metal of the whistle. The high elf guard raised a baton defensively, but Lloyd swung his sword into the gap between the guard’s gauntlet and bracer, cutting deeply enough into the flesh to break the man’s forearm and send the baton clattering to the ground. Face melting and armor warping, the guard fell to the ground but, in defiance of physics, medicine, and basic logic, somehow found the wherewithal to blow the whistle loudly and clearly.

A body hit the floor, and Lloyd turned to find Nurana tossing the other guard into the pile of corpses. “Damnit, the whole building might hear that!” she yelled over the sound of more boots approaching.


	80. Dungeon Diving into the Depths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fight, the heat, the slag, the sweat, and everything else.

No longer daring to question her, Lloyd helped Nurana lift one of the corpses. “Light it on fire in midair!” she cried, not yelling to order him, but due to the emergency they were facing as half a dozen more guards responded to the whistleblower.

Doing as she said, Lloyd ignite the Thalmor guard corpse after they tossed it, leaving the flaming corpse to tumbled down what was - as he now realized - a ramp leading downward behind the door. The corpse rolled downward, leading to a great deal of shouting by half a dozen guards he couldn’t yet see due to the incline of the ramp.

“Again! Do it with all of them!” Nurana yelled.

One by one, all seven corpses were thrown and then set on fire, tumbling downward like flaming barrels. As they let the bodies hit the floor, the ramp tunnel was filled with the foul odor of burning flesh, leather, and metal, leading to more coughing and yelling from the responding guards below. Frost magic crinkled as the fires were extinguished, leaving Nurana to start pulling on the door.

“We need cover!” she whispered, and Lloyd immediately understood. Together, they pulled the door off its hinges and held it in front of them. “Light the front on fire and get ready to move!”

He did as he was told, setting the door ablaze and holding it in front of them like a burning shield. Nurana stood behind him and pushed, impatient with his cautious speed and nearly causing him to slide down the ramp. Panicked and moving toward unseen enemies faster than he was comfortable, he was jolted hard when the first weapon poked the door.

Leaning out from behind him, Nurana let her newly acquired magic fly loose for the second time since she’d received it. Bolts of lightning arched out of her fingers, dancing on the surface of multiple suits of elven armor and causing the guards to yelp like stray dogs and pull back. Lloyd’s heart pounded in his chest cavity like a steel drum, and he tried not to think about how crazy it was to carry a burning piece of wood down an unventilated shaft in the face of armed opposition. Nurana continued pushing him forward even when he tried to stop moving, causing his boots to slide forward on the stone floors. Straight bolts of lightning shot from her hand when she leaned out from the other side, leading to more shouts and curses to accompany the sparks and smoke. A solid object hit the door, prompting her to reach around Lloyd and stab whoever was on the other side with an arming sword she’d pilfered, and the attacker retreated.

By the time they’d reached the bottom of the shaft, the guards had wisened up to their game. A frost spell poured over them, dousing the flaming door and freezing portions of its surface. On instinct, Lloyd stuck his hand directly into the icy spell and absorbed it, feeling another person’s Magicka coursing through him. He dropped the door, revealing the guards lining up to defend another door in the second before he cast columns of flames directly beneath their feet. Even with their magic resistance, the fire burned them, and Lloyd’s previous apprehension disappeared once he was faced directly with the enemy with no safe means of backing down. Fear propelled him to pick up a discarded baton and strike the first guard who leaped over the flames, breaking the Altmer woman’s elbow and shoving her down into the fire. Nurana joined him, shooting bolts of electricity through the tongues of flame, wearing the guards down until one desperate individual panicked, unlocked the door, and retreated inside to the rancor of his more level-headed colleagues. With their morale broken, Nurana set upon the remaining handful, stabbing over the flames deftly and poking holes in whichever patches of flesh were exposed by gaps in the armor. It was a truly horrendous sight: the guards were burning, shocked, and being slowly stabbed to death by a maniac who didn’t even have the decency to finish her victims off fast.

Lloyd hung back until she’d disabled them, tossing the miserable survivors to the side where they could painfully die of their wounds. He looked at her quizzically. “The alarm has been sounded; we don’t need to finish them off anymore,” she said harshly while kicking a begging high elf guard hard enough to move the poor sod out of her way.

“Ah. I see.” He took care not to step in pools of blood while she opened the door. “So what’s next? Do we find the - whoa…”

His voice trailed off when they opened the metal door and peeked through. A sizable cavern opened up before them, cold and dank with still air while an army of dust motes floated in the empty space all the way down to numerous lanes of standalone jail cells. Makeshift walls erected long after the underground jail’s excavation lined the veritable abyss, yet the entire place laid dead silent, absent of the rabble normally associated with prison. More tunnels leading out from the main cavern could be seen, all of them lined with more cells. It was unsanitary, unsafe, and unpleasant beyond words.

The two of them lingered for a moment, just trying to take the expansive pits of jail cells in. Lloyd walked through the door first, stepping into a well-built wooden platform overlooking the entirety of the underground prison. “I guess that warehouse-looking building was intended to conceal the entrance to this,” he murmured while counting the number of wooden steps leading down to the cell blocks.

A scream from behind him caught his attention, and he turned to find Nurana perched over the last surviving Thalmor guard. Charred and stabbed, the man flailed on the ground helplessly while the Dark Seducer dug the sharp fingers of her gauntlet into a pressure point under the man’s nose. Lloyd bristled at the image of torture, but she angrily pointed at and waved him away.

“Prisoner manifest. Now,” she hissed at the guard.

“Divines take you, foul demon!” the guard shrieked in pain. She pinched harder and rested a knee on the small of his back. “Down the stairs, in the, down the stairs in the only room there! It’s there!”

Once he’d confessed, she pulled her dagger out and killed him anyway even when Lloyd held his hands out to prevent her. She winced in pain even though her disobedience to his command was unintentional, but she wouldn’t back down. “He was dying anyway, you idiot! That was a mercy killing! Make up your mind about what you want!”

“Shush, not so loud! I get it, but keep your voice down.” He looked back to the door. “For sure, there are more guards here. We need to be careful.”

Adrenaline from the conflict propelled her through the door so quickly that she bumped into him harder than was polite. “No, I need to be careful; you just need to do what I tell you. Let me handle things.” She walked away before he could even respond, irritating him with her bossiness. He grumbled and walked after her, hurrying to follow her to whatever room they were supposed to search.


	81. He Locates Her Cell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The culmination approaches.

There had actually been several rooms below the wooden platform, including two where Nurana killed more unsuspecting guards, but they’d found the records room rather quickly. Lloyd had to flex his considerable willpower to avoid delving into the secrets the Thalmor kept hidden away and focus on what had drawn him to their rescue operation so strongly. Notepads and lose papers flew about as he rummaged through ever shelf and drawer he could.

“Aha! Yes! This has to be it,” he said, shaking one of the notepads in his hand. “They clearly don’t name their prisoners here, but I can deduce what their labels mean. A small number of inmates bear the initial D, which I believe means daedra. This is always followed by the initials for what appear to be an associated cult or lord, but some of the names with such initials aren’t marked with a D; I assume those are mortal cultists.”

Nurana just stop watch by the door, barely even paying attention to him. “Yeah,” she murmured, crouching and listening for guards.

“They’ve also labeled the dates on which inmates were admitted. I remember when Tammaeroth was taken, so I can deduce when she was admitted here.” He flipped back and forth between two specific pages a few times. “On that date, there’s an entry marked with D and MD. She still wears the red body marks of Clan Dagon, so I can see that. There’s also a note on that entry remarking that the inmate refuses to talk; it doesn’t say about what, but the inmate won’t talk, and most other entries have no notes at all. That sounds like her.” Nurana snorted dismissively, but Lloyd ignored her while looking over the last few pages. “I think I know where she is - cell ‘Pristine Casing the Third,’ whatever that means. We can check labels on cells as we go.”

Nurana stopped him at the door, grabbing him by the sleeve. “Slow down, damnit! Don’t get us killed when we’ve already come this far.” She pried the door open ever so slowly. “Only Follow when I signal.”

She slinked out of the room and crept toward the first row of cells, waiting before she waved for him to follow. Notepad and stolen jail keys in hand, he tried not to grind his boots into the dirt and gravel on the cell block floor, but the cavern was so unkempt - and so out of character for a facility of the Aldmeri government - that he found it hard to sneak. She scowled at him more than once while he followed her, but the sorry sight of the prisoners as they passed the cell blocks made them realize that nobody would raise any more alarms.

The prisoners…what a miserable lot. The overwhelming majority of them were clearly not heretics of any kind, but none of them were foreigners, either; there were no Bosmer or even Khajiit. Every one of them was a high elf, most bearing the thin builds and pale complexions of nobles and the intelligentsia. And they were dirty. Neglect and malnutrition had left them in disgusting states, and the stench of dung, semen, menstrual blood, vomit, and sweat filled the air as they passed by each cell. One after the other, the prisoners made little effort other than watching the two intruders while they passed by; nobody even bothered to beg for release.

“These people don’t even have basic sanitary care,” Lloyd whispered while they passed from the first cell block to the second. “There’s food just tossed on the floor…my word, even the flies in here have flies-“

“Shush,” Nurana hissed while stopping him. The sound of footsteps briefly echoed from far across the cavern and then stopped. Harsh, urgent words were shared far away. “They know we’re here,” she whispered. She then pointed to the end wall of a cell block across from them. “There, those cells with full metal doors. That row has a placard on it.”

She pointed again, showing him the label ‘Pristine Casing’ tacked to the makeshift wall of the cell block. He tried to move, but she snarled at him and shoved him backward, ever protective for his sake and, indirectly, hers. Annoyed but understanding her concern, he acquiesced and let her scout ahead first. When she crossed the gap between the rows and reached the next cell block, she waited for a long time before moving. Growing impatient, Lloyd nearly moved without her cue before he, too, heard the sound of footsteps on the other side of the row which he was hiding behind. A pacing guard caused Lloyd’s heart rate to spike, and he stared at Nurana’s hands waiting for her signal and imagining scenarios wherein they were flooded by hordes of armored guards from all sides.

Finally, she did beckon him, and he hurried over so abruptly that she had to grab him before he kicked a rock which would have made a lot of noise. The footsteps continued, sweeping through an intersection where he would have been seen had he not moved. She grabbed his chin and turned his head to see the third door down in their row.

“I’ll stay outside for a moment; just make this quick,” Nurana whispered. “Don’t let her delay us. We need to get out of here!”

“Aren’t you at risk if exposure if you stay outside?” he asked.

“I know how to hide, and we need someone out here as a lookout, you freaking procrastinator! Get your ass in there and untie her. Or don’t. Just finish so we can leave!”

“Alright, alright! I’m going!” he said while creeping toward the third door and fumbling with the keys.

“Faster, we need to go! I’m serious! I don’t want us to die because of her!”

“Nurana, you’re not helping, just let me focus on the keys!” It took him seventeen tries before he found the right one. “There! I’m going!”

“Fine!” she whispered.

Anxiety welling up inside him, he realized that he was about to see the person he'd been seeking after spending days which had felt like years. Not wanting to torture himself with the suspense, he pushed the door open and entered, letting it close quietly behind him.


	82. Reunited

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Together again in body, though not necessarily in spirit.

Lloyd’s fingers trembled as he closed the door behind him, so much so that the keys clanked in his hands. The muscles in his legs strained as if he’d been running a marathon, spontaneously twitching even though he hadn’t exerted himself too much during the earlier confrontation. His entire journey, the whole ordeal he’d gone through, had been building up to that moment; yet, when finally there, at his destination, he found himself in a state of shock which paralyzed him.

At one end of the room, he stood, frozen by the cell door while across from him, a mere three yards away, laid the person who’d unknowingly pulled him back to her. When he stared at her body crumpled on the floor, however; and when he stared at the torture rack behind her; and when he stared at the blood-stained implements of torment scattered about the floor; when he stared at all of that, the gap between them opened up like a canyon a full league wide.

The air hung so still that sounds from the outside were as muffled as those from within. Nothing moved an inch, not even him at first, as he surveyed the gory evidence of his failure. Whether he’d arrived a day late or two or three didn’t matter, for it may as well have been years. At the root of it, he was only staring at a stiff carbon unit, a hunk of torn and battered flesh bereft of life. On tingling feet full of pins and needles, he walked forward, nearly wavering as he tried to retain his sense of balance. He took care not to step on any of the torture tools on his way over to her, treating the artifacts of her departure as sacred relics of how she’d been lost. When he finally did reach her body, he knelt next to her and found himself unable to move for a good, long while. Too long considering the danger he was in after the guards had raised the alarm, but he found his sense of focus muddled.

Eventually, he mustered up the fortitude to lay his hands on her, trying to feel what had happened. As weak as his restoration magic was, it didn’t take an expert to know that the dirty, ripped prisoner’s rags she wore indicated how difficult her end had been. Her skin was cold to the touch, but not as much as a corpse should have been, signaling a recent end; she was still in the process of death. There was no pulse, but occasionally he could detect the slight twitch of her arteries as her body choked on its own fluids. Rigor mortis hadn’t even set in, and when he turned her body over, her dehydrated mouth still contained a small bit of saliva in it.

Running his fingers through her blood-soaked hair to brush it away from her bruised face, he carefully avoided the spot on her temple where her skull had been cracked open. No amount of healing magic could bring a person back from such an injury, mortal or no, and he found no reason to bother healing the thin slices which the Thalmor interrogators had cut into the sensitive webbing between her fingers and toes. Truly, she had been as loyal to him as any of her kind would have been to a clan…he tried not to imagine what her final moments would have been like, with her refusing to reveal his location as the Aldmeri agents delivered a most painful, ignoble end. A few tears fell from his eyes as he removed the leather straps from her forearms and calves and found that each implement had a row of needles on the inside which had been stabbed into her skin and tied on with the straps. He’d never known a person in his entire life who would’ve endured such a fate to protect him, or anyone else for that matter.

He held her wrist, finding no pulse but noticing the miniscule residual warmth on her skin. "We were close, Tammy…I'm so sorry," he murmured.

Numb and unsure of what else to do, he recalled the words in his head for the new calling card he'd gained. His magicka had been preserved and, feeling it well up inside of him, he began to chant the profane words needed to forcibly pull an immensely powerful being from its home into his. His neurons strained as he struggled to maintain his hold on what was merely a copy, a clone, and stabilized the being's entrance into Mundus. Air rippled as a portal in the shape of a sphere pushed outward, creating space for the tentacle horror which materialized. Complete in its soggy, obese glory, Saline's projected copy appeared, holding its claws out as if it were reading an invisible book.

Displeasure filled the entire room by a means Lloyd couldn't directly see or explain, but the creature's ire was palpable. For a few seconds, Saline's flabby claws waggled as it tried to grab a nonexistent object; only when its multiple eyes fell upon the Breton kneeling over a dead body did Saline realize that it had been summoned without whatever book it had been reading. It's neck shook and bubbled, and a growl emitted from several of the orifices on its frontside.

"Why have you called on me, mortal?" the octo-demon's message projected directly into Lloyd's mind.

Emotional and barely maintaining his composure, Lloyd tried to string together a believable story. "Well," he said, pausing to take a deep breath and avoid his breath hitching in his throat. "I have some good news and some bad news."

"No, you don't," Saline boomed in his mind. "You only have bad news until your problems are resolved. You should not have interrupted me before you completed your mission."

Irritated by the flippant manner of the cephalopod daedra, Lloyd grabbed on to his own displeasure and tried to harden his resolve. "You told me that I could call on you if I need your help. Well, I need your help now. We're here, at the Thalmor prison site." Attentive and curious, Saline did pause to look around the jail cell, fixating its eyes on the door. "We're almost to the point where we can access all of their files - and more than just this shorthand prisoner's name list," he said, holding up the notepad as a piece of collateral. Saline held out one of its multiple claws for the notepad, which Lloyd handed over as a peace offering. "Unfortunately, my first assistant, Tammaeroth, suffered a setback while she was scouting this location ahead of us."

"That's not a matter of concern; you have a second assistant, that screeching violet thing," Saline replied, not even bothering to look at Lloyd as it flipped through the notepad as if the labels and initials were truly fascinating.

"Actually, it IS a matter of concern," Lloyd replied, barely masking the agitation in his voice as his sorrow turned to anger. "The odds against us are quite overwhelming here, so I'll need the help of both of them to overcome the Altmer guards in here."

Saline didn't even appear to be listening while it read every line of the notepad. "Altmer? What? Oh, whatever. If they stand in our way, then I'll flay them alive. Just…hmm…wait for a few minutes while I finish this."

"I wouldn't need to wait, Saline, if I had my second assistant with me," Lloyd said pointedly, still being mostly ignored by the tentacle terror. "In fact, if we multitask, you can continue reading without me bothering you. I just need Tammaeroth revived."

The last word, in particular, caught the High Seeker's attention. "Revived?" Saline asked in such a way that its unpleasant surprise was apparent even in a telepathic message. It glanced at Tammaeroth's body, only then noticing her condition. "Useless. I can still sense her animus as its wedging its way in between Mundus and Oblivion."

Lloyd's eyes lit up. "Really?" he asked excitedly. "You can locate her?"

"Not really," Saline replied while shaking its bulbous head. "I can feel her because her body only recently died of dehydration while in a coma. She has no oath to a prince, nor does she deserve one, so there's no telling where her vestige will reform after it swims in the Void for a while."

"But now! You can still sense her now?!"

"I'm a bit busy, mortal," it replied flippantly while waving him away with a spare claw.

"Saline, can you find where she is and put her animus back into this body? I can do the rest of the healing once she has a heartbeat, but I need her animus back!"

"Quiet, you," it replied, brushing him off again while it continued reading.

"Damnit, Saline, I'm being serious!" Lloyd shouted while standing up, greatly annoying and disturbing the ever-diligent reader.

"Watch your tongue, boy. For that remark, you've lost any assistance from me without a price, and you have nothing to give."

"You took my knowledge before. I offer it to you again!" he said urgently, catching the High Seeker's attention. "You took knowledge of shock magic from my head and put it into Nurana's; take what you want for your own if you can help me bring Tammaeroth back!"

Allured by the promise of instant knowledge, the aquatic demon didn't need long to consider the offer. "Very well…I'll grant you access to more of Apocrypha's servants; they're certainly more capable than you. Give me your runic magic, and you may have access to my portable chironasium."

Confused at first, Lloyd hesitated for a moment as he remembered how useful his runes had always been. "But…all of my illusion spells are runes, I…" He looked back at Tammaeroth's lifeless body, and imagined her animus flailing and reaching for help as it was swept away in the waters of the Void. "Alright," he said, squaring his shoulders and preparing for the pain he'd felt the last time he'd made a deal with Saline. "I'm ready."

"Done," Saline answered before promptly returning to the notepad.

Lloyd nearly went cross-eyed. "What do you mean done? Nothing happened."

"Because you were willing this time. Rest assured, you don't know your runic magic anymore, but you may summon Rehala. Go ahead. You already know her neonymic and paleonymic."

"Who on Nirn is…" Lloyd's voice trailed off, and he visibly jumped when he realized that there was information in his head which he'd never honestly learned. "How in the blazes do I know the paleonymic Wakhachola-Po-"

Upon reciting the name, another spherical portal from Apocrypha opened up, revealing a rather short Dremora popping up out of nowhere and almost prompting him to strike out defensively. Tammaeroth herself was short by Dremora standards and he'd gotten used to her, but this new person was short even by human standards. Her robes were most definitely those of a civilian, a caste of Dremora he'd read about but never met. She carried with her a foldable table and a briefcase full of enchanting equipment which would have made Lloyd jealous under other, less dire circumstances.

"Rehala answers your call, unknown one," the Dremora enchanter said in a normal, single voice without the cadence of the more militant castes of daedra.

Thinking of all the possibilities, Lloyd pushed the disappointment at having willingly given up all of his runes aside and focused on saving the life of a person who actually mattered to him. "Yes, nice to meet you, we can introduce ourselves later. Look," he said while motioning toward Tammaeroth's corpse. "Her body died recently, but her animus hasn't been dragged out of Mundus yet. I need to get her animus back into her body so I can heal her.

The short Dremora sporting a short haircut far too stylish for an unholy demoness looked her compatriot's dead body over coldly. "Well, black soul gems can be used to revive recently fallen persons, and I have the skills to do so," Rehala replied. Without skipping a beat, she added the caveat. "As soon as you give me a black soul gem."

Growing more frustrated by the moment, Lloyd's hands began to tremble again. "I don't…Saline, this isn't enough!" he said, causing Rehala to gasp in offense. "Sorry, I don't mean that you're not enough, I mean that I need more help. Saline!"

Also frustrated, Saline blew air out of its orifices as if it were sighing. "You need a black soul gem. You're not getting it for free."

Frowning deeply, Lloyd realized that he was in one of those rare, one-in-a-million hypothetical scenarios where one had to choose between their passion in life and a person they cared deeply for. "My magic…Saline, as you serious? We might lose Tammaeroth!"

"She's a daedra, we don't die forever. Not unless we're cursed like your other assistant." The High Seeker flipped through the notepad, ignoring Lloyd's plea callously. "She'll reform after a while and be fine."

"NO, Saline, she won't be fine. You said we won't even know where she is! I don't know the specific words I need to resummon her because she isn't bound to me. What if she reforms in Infurnace or something? She'll be lost and alone. I can't let that happen-"

"Your light spell," Saline said without even looking up.

"Come again?"

"Your light spell. You want a soul gem? Give me your light spell."

"Saline…are you serious?" the Breton sighed in despair. "I've spent my whole adult life learning my spells. That might seem like a long time to you, but do you really need to take away everything I've strived for?"

"Yes, if you really want me to help you save this worthless wretch who failed in her mission to get you off this island already. You're very late, by the way."

Lloyd gritted his teeth at the telepathic disrespect but tried to focus on his priority of pulling Tammaeroth out of the Void. "Fine. Take it for now if we can at least bring her back from the brink."

"Done. You may now summon Apocrypha's merchant."

"How? I…wait, I feel it again." Lloyd sighed, feeling the loss of his rather useful light magic as well, and chanted the words in his mind to bring forth yet another globe of conjuration magic. Another relatively short Dremora appeared, also wearing a robe but sporting a much more jovial attitude. "You're the merchant?"

Not phased by the summoning in the least, the Dremora merchant already appeared enthusiastic. "Indeed, and I'm thrilled to be in Mundus again. Let's make a deal!" the merchant crooned like some back alley snake oil salesman.

"Yes, of course. I need a black soul gem so your colleague her can save my colleague there."

The merchant and the enchantress nodded to each other. "Nice to see you again Rehala," the merchant said before turning back to Lloyd. "I believe I can pull a few black soul gems out of a storage pod in a matter of moments. Those are 750 coins each, by the way."

"What!" Lloyd exclaimed, annoying Saline and Rehala with the volume of his voice but entertaining the merchant as if that was a common occurrence. "You're a summoned minion, why are you asking for money I don't have?"

The merchant folded his arms. "I don't know what type of minions you're used to, but in Apocrypha, Lord Mora treats all of us as valued servants so long as we obey his will. I'm at your beck and call, but fair is fair."

Instead of berating the surprisingly honest merchant, Lloyd looked angrily at Saline. "Why would you think I have money in a time like this?!" he yelled, annoying the High Seeker even more.

"Rest assured that I don't think about you at all," Saline replied brusquely. "Your finances are none of my concern-"

This time, it was Lloyd who interrupted. "Saline, I need a way to get some money! I need a black soul gem! I'm being serious, you won't receive any of the secret documents you seek without my help, and I can't help you without Tammaeroth!"

Slapping the notepad closed, Saline wiggled its rubbery forehead into what looked like a glare. "You've already taken quite enough, whelp!"

"Not as much as you, and you're getting nothing other than that single notepad unless you get me some money! The entire book room of this place is lost to you unless you help me! Secret knowledge will be left buried!"

Bubbling and puffing with anger, Saline seethed but also relented when it was teased with the loss of knowledge. "Then I want your restoration magic!"

"What!"

"Yes, your restoration magic! You're not even talented at it, so I want everything or your precious minion will drown in the unknown depths of Oblivion, you petulant vertebrate!"

"Damn you, Saline, damn you all the way into the darkness yourself!" Lloyd shouted, causing the two civilian Dremoras' eyes to shoot open wide in shock. "Everything I've striven for since leaving Daggerfall, everything I've devoted myself to, my life's work and achievements, you're taking all of it! Everything! What will even be left of me at the end of this? What will I even have to show for this one measley mission on your behalf?"

"Her," Saline answered immediately, pointed at Tammaeroth with a stiff claw. The two of them both glared at each other across the imaginary line drawn between them. "Make your choice, Lloyd Rolsen."

Just then, Nurana crept inside of the cell door, noticing the group assembled around Tammaeroth. Perplexed at the dead body and scared of Saline, she remained silent, almost walking back out of the cell at first. Neither the Breton nor the High Seeker noticed her, though, as they engaged in their petty staredown.

"Do it," Lloyd whispered, burning in rage at the creature which he'd expected to be his ally.

"It is done," Saline communicated right back in a faint mental message like a whisper, mocking him and his rage. "Our plane's butler is yours."

"Butler?" Lloyd asked incredulously.

Just then, a fourth summoning sphere popped into existence, leaving an elegantly dressed Dremora who nevertheless appeared bored with life. The Dremora butler didn't even bother introducing himself, merely folding his arms behind his back and waiting for orders. The Breton looked at Saline in sincere confusion before turning to the butler.

"I need 750 coins," Lloyd said urgently.

Not caring about the urgency of the situation, nor even bothering to ask what the money was for, the butler sighed. "I have cups and plates worth six coins."

All three of the servants were aghast and began backing away when Lloyd growled out loud like Nurana. Turning abruptly toward Saline, he finally began to yell. "What is the meaning of this, you spineless slimeball!" he yelled, using the edgiest insults which his conservative upbringing would allow.

Creeping behind him and trying to pull him away, Nurana finally spoke up. "Stop! You have no idea who you're dealing with!" she whispered.

Ignoring her entirely, he unloaded his negativity onto the octopus-daedra. "I have a person who's absolutely essential to this operation on the verge of being lost in the Void, and you're stealing my entire life's work just to make some useless point!"

"Watch your tone, mammal," Saline warned.

"No, watch your obedience, minion!" Lloyd yelled, causing everyone else to cry out and continue backing away.

"I'm not with him!" the Dremora merchant stammered.

"Lloyd, no! That thing is fucking dangerous," Nurana exclaimed, still trying to pull him away. "You don’t know what Saline is capable of!"

"Listen to your wench, Rolsen," Saline warned again.

Casting common sense aside, Lloyd delivered the surprise of the immortal demons' lives when he delivered a swift kick to Saline's blubbery hide. Much like how an abusive, low-class thug would kick a disobedient dog, Lloyd's kick was less meant to hurt (he wouldn't have been able to hurt the High Seeker anyway) and more meant to denigrate and discipline. A gurgling growl emitted from Saline's orifices, scaring everyone else so much that the butler ran to hide behind the torture rack and Rehala actually discorporated into Oblivion due to fear. Nurana tried with such an effort to hold Lloyd back that he actually shoved her to the ground, and the two of them resembled trashy rural teenagers scuffling at a barnyard dance party.

"Listen here, you useless minion!" Lloyd yelled, sending the entire room into pandemonium. Even Saline looked too shocked to communicate. "You exist on this plane at my behest, in my service! You're the subservient party here, present only to obey my orders or be dismantled into the Void! And I've had enough with your pedantic games! I command you by your paleonymic, Saei-Loa Nigh, to put Tammaeroth's animus back into her body and save her from the Void in any way you can, you ornery slave!"

"Holy shit, we're all going to die horribly," Nurana grumbled, not even bothering to stand back up.

Long, sustained growling pumped out of Saline's orifices, droning into a sound like bagpipes as the creature's anger found itself no direct release. "You insolent, petulant…" It's telepathy trailed off into irrelevance as it realized, despite all of it's posturing, that it was only a summoned minion; Lloyd really did have the upper hand. However, after contemplating the matter, its gross eyes shined with deviousness. "Any way I can?" it asked.

"Yes, just save her now! Don't let her be lost to the darkness!" he replied without thinking.

Before he could amend his words, one of Saline's tentacles wrapped around his left hand, reaching down toward Tammaeroth's cold left hand as well. A familiar intrusion into his brain caused him another nosebleed, accompanied by the familiar searing pain on his left ring finger so excruciating that he wished he could amputate the digit. He groaned in pain, falling to his knees.

"You still have one free hand…so I can curse one more insolent vertebrate in attachment to you," Saline boomed into his skull. "Your fire magic shall no longer be yours. You want her saved?" it asked while Tammaeroth's body began to twitch and spasm. "Then give up what you desired the most."

Everyone else hit the floor when Tammaeroth's body began to glow green, though instead of exploding, she merely thrashed on the ground as the light faded. Saline released them both, satisfied that it had taken some form of revenge for the reprimand it had received from a mortal. Too hurt to even talk, Lloyd rolled over onto his side and reeled from the loss of most of his magical repotoire in mere moments. But to his relief, Tammaeroth was looking back at him, her wounds partially healed, and very much alive.


	83. Two Familiar Faces Return

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The happy reunion lasts for a while, but not long enough. Bodies hit the floor, and a familiar reunion-crashes reveals himself.

Green smoke cleared around them, dissipating as slowly as the unspeakable pain which Lloyd felt in his left ring finger. Reeling from the hurt in such a small part of his body, he didn't even know how to stand anymore and just laid on the dusty, unwashed floor while his pulse throbbed in his whole hand. His brain pulsated like he'd ingested drugs, and when Nurana tried to help him stand, he didn't know if she was pulling him up off the floor or peeling him down off the ceiling.

Dizzy and disoriented, Lloyd noticed that the Dremora merchant had somehow teleported back into Oblivion, leaving the butler to cower in a corner. The enchantress Rehala had already disappeared before that. Ignoring Saline's smug swagger, his eyes fixated on Tammaeroth, whose body had begun to stir. She was in an altered state - the once red markings formerly signifying Clan Dagon had turned dark green, as had the streaks in her otherwise black hair. Most importantly, though, her temple had been partially mended, leaving behind a wound which was ugly but not serious enough to cause permanent damage. Her body trembled and quaked, and she moved with the stiffness of a person who'd slept in a bad position for an extended period of time.

Pulling away from Nurana, Lloyd stumbled to the ground right next to Tammaeroth and lifted her head and shoulders into his arms. "Sure, just forget about me trying to save your ass," Nurana muttered resentfully.

"No, I know, you know, just wait," he groaned in response, working through the pain with a measure of difficulty. Tammaeroth opened her eyes, formerly black, now yellow, but she didn't seem to be aware of where she was. "Tammy, you made it…I thought you were lost in the Void."

Even more disoriented than he was, she was oddly passive in his arms at first, not fighting for her personal space as he'd expected. Strained hands still hurting from the torture clutched at his stolen spy's cape and cowl, revealing dried blood from when the Thalmor had shoved a scalpel beneath her fingernails. With her wounds mostly healed, she was able to feel until she reached for the hood and pulled it off of him, revealing his identity fully. Utter disbelief marked her face as she coughed, clearing her throat so she could speak in a sore, raspy voice.

"Lloyd?" she asked with a mouth so dry that everyone felt dehydrated just listening to her. "How did you…why aren't in in Shimmerene?" Her brows arched angrily for a split second before softening when he smiled instead of answering. "Thanks for not dying."

He chuckled lightly, happy that she really had been revived. "You too," he replied.

She immediately tried to stand up, regaining her sense of independence once she remembered where she was. "How did you find this place," she rasped while he helped her up. The moment she laid eyes on Nurana, she hissed like a tigress and fell forward from Lloyd's arms. "You!"

Nurana was so taken off guard that she didn't raise her hands to defend herself, and a sloppy, telegraphed haymaker Tammaeroth threw connected with the side of the Dark Seducer's face with a loud smack. They both fell to their knees, one due to fatigue and the other due to a suckerpunch.

"You fucking bitch, you cut my cheek open!" Nurana cried while clutching her bleeding mouth. The punch was only a lucky shot given Tammaeroth's condition, but what a lucky shot it was. To Lloyd's relief, Nurana didn't fight back and just stood behind him, spitting blood out of her mouth so she could talk. "Lloyd, defend my honor!" she demanded with reddened teeth.

Standing in between them, he tried his best to be neutral, though his joy at seeing Tammaeroth alive again influenced him strongly. "Let's just say that everything is even now so we can all get along."

"What!" both daedra asked incredulously.

"Tammy…Nurana is on our side now. I mean, legitimately on our side; she's no longer a servant of Molag Bal. Isn't that right, Nurana?"

"Tammy?" Nurana asked mockingly, but when she saw Tammaeroth regaining enough sense of balance to stand up on her own, and thus pose a threat, the Seducer wiped the smirk off of her face. "I…won't be welcome in Coldharbour anymore," she said with some regret.

Tense and aggressive when faced with someone who'd once tried to kill her, Tammaeroth was an unstable mess of skepticism and pity; she wasn't a stranger to being cast down. "Good," she said, sneering in a way that spoke of both congratulations as well as a taunt. The two of them looked each other over awkwardly, neither of them wanting to break the silence first.

Saline floated into everyone's field of vision. "Seeing as how you have what you want," it messaged Lloyd, "it would behoove you to fulfill your end of the bargain. You promised me access to the Thalmor’s records.”

“Right, of course. Tammy, listen…Nurana and I discovered the record room where the Thalmor keep all of their registers as well as plans for their political prisoners. As soon as we take Saline back there, we’ll be good to go.” He turned to Nurana, trying his best to keep her involved and maintain the peace. “Isn’t that right?”

Even with half her face obscured by her helmet, her surprise was apparent. “We…what?” she asked, clearly caught off guard. “Well, no. Yes. Maybe?” Saline floated around until it was in her field of vision, giving her a jolt. "There was a complication while you were all in here arguing. I'm surprised none of you have heard what's going on outside."

"What are you…" Lloyd's voice trailed off, and he actually listened to the ambient noise. Shouts and clanging metal reached the otherwise airtight jail cell. "I didn't notice with everything that happened in here…Nurana, what's going on out there?"

"One of the guards found dust disturbed by your footprints and followed the trail here. He sounded another alarm before I killed him, so I found a row of levers at the center of the cell blocks and pulled all of them."

She spoke so casually that Lloyd thought her to be joking at first, but his jaw dropped when she didn't smile. "You let all of the inmates out, didn’t you?"

"Yep."

"You do realize that some of them may be legitimately dangerous, right? Especially the followers of other daedric princes?"

"Yep. It seemed like a good idea at the time, though. I have no regrets." She folded her arms defiantly and refused to apologize, causing the Dremora butler to begin pacing around the corner of the room nervously.

Wiggling its flabby claws together, Saline bobbed up and down in the air giddily. "This sounds like a delightful distraction," it broadcast into their minds so forcefully that the signal might have reached the inmates outside.

"Delightful? We passed at least thirty mortal inmates on our way here, and this row of enclosed cells all contain daedra," Lloyd scoffed at the octodemon. "How do you intend to find what you seek if we're mobbed as soon as we exit?"

Irritated but also amused, Saline waved Lloyd away with a tentacle. "Please. Just stand aside if you value your bodily wellbeing." The High Seeker then turned toward the cowering butler. "You, stay with them. I'll need you to carry everything when we're done."

The depressed butler wrought its hands but followed reluctantly. "Of course," the thin Dremora replied.

Blowing a small bubble from one of its various bodily openings, Saline caused the jail cell door to pop open. Without giving any instructions or warning to anyone else, it floated outside into the rancor of what was happening. Lloyd tried to walk outside, but Nurana and Tammaeroth each grabbed him by either arm.

"Slow down, idiot!" Nurana exclaimed.

"Be careful, Lloyd," Tammaeroth said.

The two of them look passed him and at each other, awkward and wary. More and more uncomfortable by the second, Lloyd only then realized that he now had two immortal demonesses bound to him, vested in his protection, but bearing no mutual admiration. The complications of the way he related to each of them didn't help with the discomfort they all shared. Fortunately for the inadvertent threesome, the sound of shrieks and screams grew so loud that their attention was drawn away from each other. With both daedric warriors walking in front of him as living shields, they all exited, narrowly avoiding several slimy pieces of a dismantled spider daedra flying right by them down the row.

Although the scene in the cavernous prison couldn't be described as pandemonium, the mass jailbreak was certainly beyond the control of the few guards who were still there. The three of them followed the trail of severed body parts, all of them marked with residual ripples in the air created by Saline's audial attacks. Row after row of chaotic scenes played out as they all crept by so as not to draw attention to themselves: educated Altmer dissidents stoning Thalmor guards to death, those same dissident intelligentsia being tormented by released daedra of various persuasions, those same daedra being torn apart by the actual hardened Altmer criminals who'd deserved to be in jail, a flaming torch which Nurana had pulled off the wall-

"Nurana, stop playing around!" Lloyd warned her while they tried to find the rest of Saline's trail.

She stuck the burning torch into the wooden support beam of one of the jail cells. "Right, just looking for weapons," she replied while picking up a decent axe from another Seducer's corpse. Tammaeroth noticed and followed suit, grabbing a mace from another corpse despite being so hurt that she couldn't effectively wield it.

A disconcerting sound reached their ears, rippling like an unnatural wave in a contaminated pond. More screams rang out from another row of cells, signaling the identity of the sound wave's source. The trio hurried up their pace, dodging a pair of dueling high elf political rebels and stepping over a dying dissident journalist on their way to the scene. A swarm of Scamps, Skaafin, and even a Xivilai were running straight toward them, barreling like a tsunami of horns and claws so quickly that Nurana shoved Lloyd and even Tammaeroth back around a corner, narrowly missing the stampede. Terror marked the features of the daedra until a shimmering distortion in the air hit them, sending all of their bodies flying. The force was such that a few of the Scamps lost limbs, and the Xivilai hit the bars of a jail cell so hard that it didn't get back up. The trio moved back around the corner to find Saline at the far end of the row, slowly hovering toward the wooden stairs leading out of the cavern.

"He's going the wrong way," Nurana said.

"Don't yell, it will draw too much attention to us," Tammaeroth cautioned.

"I wasn't going to yell, plus you don't have the proper context for this escape! Just follow my lead!"

Tammaeroth hissed at the Seducer, but Lloyd grabbed both of them by the arm as they'd done with him. "Let's just hurry before he leaves!" he said, tugging so they'd both move in front of him. They responded to his prompting, jogging so he remained behind them. Once they were close enough to Saline, the blubbery blob of a demon heard them and rotated to receive them.

"I'm done having fun now. I believe you owe me a stash of records."

"Yes, of course, it's through that door," Lloyd said while pointing toward the door. "Nurana, show it inside - stop playing with those!"

Once again, she'd taken a torch off of the wall and had rolled it in the straw mattresses of a few inmates which had been dragged into one of the rows between cells. "Right, right," she replied, taking the keys and walking past him to the record room. "Don't let him die; you're stuck with him like I am," she whispered to Tammaeroth, who still didn't entirely know what was going on.

"I'm more capable than you," Tammaeroth replied, mustering the best retort she could while dazed, injured, and only recently returning from the brink of death.

Nurana opened the door to the book room and then moved out of Saline's way. The relatively modest number of shelves elicited a pleased sigh from what appeared to be the High Seeker's olfactory receptors. "Yes, this will be a nice addition to the current affairs section…those alt-mer or whatever they call themselves surely wouldn't have liked these records to be uncovered. You!" Saline snapped at the butler. "I want everything!"

"But, I can't lift all of those!"

"Then start hauling!" Saline boomed while opening a shimmering distortion in the air which reached internal stability.

The butler did as he was told, grabbing stacks of books and sticking them through the distortion into what must have been Apocrypha. Tammaeroth found a Thalmor prison guard's corpse among the many dead bodies which had been scattered about and began to wear whatever portions of the glass armor would fit her, leaving Nurana to guard Lloyd while a sizeable group of Altmer nobles and political extremists rushed up the wooden stairs and back to the surface. Seeing everyone occupied, Lloyd approached Saline.

"We need a way out of here," he said to the tentacular blob.

"I gave you two ways out," Saline replied while pointing to the Breton's two demonic bodyguards.

"It's obvious that you and the butler are headed back to Apocrypha. Just take us with you and then Tammaeroth's mission will be complete."��"Absolutely not; that wasn't the condition," Saline said pointedly. "The mission was that she had to get you to the specific portal from which she entered into your realm. If she takes the easy way out, then I'll never take her to Old Antecedent for an oath-swearing. Those are the rules."

"They're arbitrary and illogical rules!"

"They're the rules she and I agreed on, and your binding spell on me personally can't affect the stipulations of her mission. If you don't want to cast her adrift in the waters of the Void, then don't break the rules!"

Pushed to the edge due to the frantic situation in the prison riot as well as the stress of having only barely pulled Tammaeroth back from the brink, Lloyd felt that unnatural, unwelcome part of him float up to the surface again. "One day, Saline, I will command you again, and I'll make you inflict horrible torment upon your own self," Lloyd warned, almost feeling sick again in reaction to how inauthentic that aggression seemed for him.

"Why would you? I've given you more than you deserved. I granted you two thralls who can and must die for you if needed, I've given you information on how you can escape, I cleared your path of salvation here among this pit of hardened criminals. And everything you've lost, whether your novice's spells, your lonesome life on Summerset, or your meager worldly possessions have been lost due to your own actions - not mine or anyone else's."

Angry but bested, Lloyd glared at Saline for a few moments and waited for a retort which never revealed itself to him. He had nothing more to add, and the losing battle of wits was distracting him from an escape he'd have to handle on his own. Unable to reply intelligently, he withdrew from the conversation, leaving the High Seeker and the Dremora butler to finish ransacking the Thalmor records while he rejoined his companions outside. Nurana was removing every torch from every sconce on the wall to fling into the cell blocks while Tammaeroth had just finished donning a patchwork of elven armor on seemingly random parts of her body due to the mismatch in body type between her and the dead Thalmor guard. He sighed deeply and didn't think about the journey they were all about to take together and the problems which could arise, focusing on their escape.

"Saline won't take us with him," he told the two daedra protectors with regret, though neither of them were bothered.

"Of course he wouldn't," Nurana replied while setting a shield rack on fire.

"We can't violate the stipulations of my mission, Lloyd!" Tammaeroth replied a little more urgently.

"In that case, we need to get out of here now. There's nothing more for us here-"

"Except your graves," boomed a voice from above them, causing all three of them to pull together and look around frantically.

Standing on the platform up the stairs was a gaunt figure, looming large over them and also flanked by two protectors. To the left and right were more heavily armored Thalmor guards waiting with their batons. In the middle, blocking their exit and holding them there in the prison full of rioting and brawling miscreants, was Druinald.


	84. Duel to the Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neither party is one to let go of grudges, to let bygones be bygones, or to let their enemies live.

The man who'd initiated the entire conflict from the very beginning stood there, calm and collected but visibly unhappy that his prisoners had been released. "You've become quite the nuisance," Druinald said in an acidic tone.

"I didn't do anything!" Lloyd replied angrily. "You drew first blood!"

Druinald ignored his response entirely. "The sheer amount of charges we can bring against you dwarf those of anybody we've locked up here; you might even be tried in the Queen's personal court given your transgressions." The Thalmor officer paused dramatically, and none of the three escapees interrupted him due to being on the defensive; Saline and the butler were already gone. "Even after all you've done, after all the innocent people you've murdered, after the millions of coins in property you've destroyed, you will still be awestruck by the mercy of the Aldmeri Dominion.

"I will ask you one last time to surrender peacefully, and I give you my word that you'll be taken into custody peacefully. Think clearly when you consider how significant my offer is."

Self-gratified and pompously generous, Druinald made no move for a sneak attack, and even his guards didn't make a move. The Thalmor officer truly thought that his offer was merciful, making him entirely closed off to negotiation. Nurana and Tammaeroth both growled but were wisely wary of the man.

Just as wary but also aware of whom he was speaking to, Lloyd didn't need much time to consider. "You showed no mercy to her," he replied while laying a hand on Tammaeroth's shoulder. "No mercy toward my associates is the same as no mercy toward me."

"Associates?" Druinald replied incredulously, his calmness transforming into outrage. "If you consider these dreadful demons your associates, then there truly is no redemption for you. You have forfeited your opportunity for mercy as well as your life in a single utterance, Mr. Rolsen, and you've forced us to invoke a summary execution."

Tammaeroth stepped in front of the other two, wielding the mace she'd picked up defensively. "You'll have to go through me first!" she hissed.

"Tammy! You're still hurt!" Lloyd whispered to her.

"He's the one!" she whispered back harshly in her ancient tongue, shushing Lloyd into silence. "The whole time they tortured me and asked where you were…he's the one who ordered it all! He directed them to do everything! I have to do this!"

She spoke with such a sense of urgency that even Nurana relented, pulling Lloyd away from the stairs. "It's safer this way," the Seducer whispered.

"Sending your daedric slaves to do your bidding?" Druinald asked sincerely, not even intending the question as a taunt. "As expected. She proved incapable before, but her resistance will serve as a valid warmup." Fluidly as if going for a weekend stroll, Druinald began to descend the wooden stairs. His slow pace enraged Tammaeroth, causing her to rush up the stairs. "The brightest flame burns quickest, monster," he warned as she bounded up to meet him halfway up the steps.

In a single loose motion, Druinald pulled his elven backsword from its scabbard and swung downward, catching the shaft of Tammaeroth's mace in a perfectly perpendicular clash of metal. The leverage of being higher, as well as her fatigue, enabled him to push downward until she lost her footing; a swift kick to her thigh sent her tumbling down, hitting the stairs hard and rolling to the ground. Lloyd raised his hands and channeled his magic, trying to heal her until he realized that he'd given all of this restoration magic away. Nothing happened and he just looked weird and panicky, which only increased Druinald's confidence.

"How disappointing," the high elf lawman said as he reached the bottom of the stairs.

Infuriated, Tammaeroth pushed herself off the ground and swung the mace in a wide arc. Even when injured, her centuries of experience showed in the way she pulled a wild swing into a near miss, swiping the mace so closely to Druinald's head that his hair was ruffled. Now more alert and taking her more seriously, he struck back more aggressively, slamming the hilt of his sword into an exposed part of her arm and following up with a long slice to the unprotected flesh of her triceps. Hissing but otherwise ignoring the pain, she swung again, forcing him to bring his sword forward defensively. She tried to headbutt him with her glass helmet, missing his forehead but hitting his shoulder hard enough to rock him back, and they disengaged. She was breathing heavily, already winded and still drained from the ordeal he'd ordered.

The two of them measured each other in silence save the impromptu party being thrown by prisoners in a cell block row too far away to be seen. Druinald began to circle, watching her movements as she watched his. He tried to riposte her, but she nearly broke the blade of his sword with her mace, forcing him to disengage. The two of them almost looked as if they were dancing, going through cycles of circling each other, engaging and disengaging, and then circling again. Most duels tended to end within fifteen to twenty seconds, but Druinald and Tammaeroth dragged their fight beyond a whole minute - an eternity for those familiar with one-on-one combat.

Losing her patience, she rushed him, swinging more offensively with the mace. For the second time, Druinald drew blood, cutting her multiple times with short, defensive thrusts until her mace connected with his forearm. He groaned out loud, stung by the blunt force trauma and switching to a one-handed grip on the backsword. Encouraged by his clear injury, she locked his weapon with hers, grappling up close and bullying the high elf toward the railing of the staircase despite being a nearly foot shorter than he was. In his desperation, he revealed his knowledge of her torture and grabbed the edge of her breastplate, running his thumb beneath it and jamming his digit straight into an open wound caused by a nail the torturers had stabbed into her shoulder.

She screamed out loud, falling back and removing the pressure from him. He followed her lockstep, holding on and keeping his thumb stuck in her bleeding wound and working with all his might to wedge his sword free. The result was the unintentional disarming of them both, leaving her unarmed and him with only his rondel, which he quickly pulled and stabbed into her other shoulder. She screamed again, finding herself unable to resist when he pushed her to the ground. Before she could even stand up, he waved his hands in the invocation of frost, causing both of her feet to be encased in blocks of ice fused to the ground. Held in place, she was helpless as he pulled back and raised both of his hands.

"No!" Lloyd gasped, but Nurana held him back.

"You'll make it worse for her if you try to help," the Dark Seducer whispered harshly, doing her best to prevent him from interfering. The two Thalmor guards watched the pair like hawks.

In a burst of light, Druinald began casting a frost spell with one hand, coating Tammaeroth in a layer of white, frozen moisture that sapped her energy and restricted her movement. She held up her hands defensively, achieving nothing as her fingers became stiff and the rest of her body was coated and chilled anyway. With his other hand, he began casting a fire spell, letting a sprayed cone spill over her until she was engulfed in plumes of orange flame. She thrashed as the frost was melted and the movement of her limbs became indiscernible from the flames; Druinald began to dual-cast the spell, pouring as much as he could to immolate her. Tongues danced to the pounding of Lloyd's heart, and he cursed himself for having let her engage the Thalmor officer in a fair fight.

Out of the fire, a dark lump moved, and Tammaeroth seemed to be clinging to life despite fighting a losing battle. Druinald didn't lose focus the entire time, maintaining the fire spell even when his target crawled across the ground. Inch by inch, the dark lump moved closer to his feet until, in a flash, it leapt up off the ground and struck out at him. Flames engulfed his hands up to the wrists, and with a loud crack, they simply stopped.

Screaming himself, Druinald watched as Tammaeroth stood back up, smoldering but unhurt aside from a bit of frostbite, having resisted the fire magic. Her fingers were interlocked with his, but hers were straight and unbroken. She'd managed to twist his wrists so much that every one of his fingers were bent disgustingly, and even his wrists were twisted so much that he fell to his knees. Without even bothering to mock him, Tammaeroth began casting the same type of flame spell right back, searing the flesh from Druinald's hands and then, when he let go and fell to the ground, his entire body. His screams stopped as his oxygen was cut off, and just in time; Tammaeroth was spent and fell to her knees in the same fashion - panting, exhausted, but very much alive.

Lloyd hurried over and wrapped his arms around her, and even Nurana joined her side, if not out of friendship than at least out of the realization that another ally helped her do her job. Applause rang out behind them, as a group of high elf nobility who hadn't participated in the riot cheered for the death of a dreaded Thalmor officer. The two guards who'd been accompanying Druinald both looked at each other and then at the burning cell blocks full of rioters who'd now seen a chance to leave the prison. Neither of them needed much time to decide that a hasty retreat was in order, and the sped off, leaving the path out of the prison unobstructed.


	85. The Great Escape

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tammaeroth may have emerged from the duel alive, but they can’t dawdle around the scene of the crime of the year.

As soon as the last two guards fled, a flood of prisoners flowed up the stairs like salmon traveling upstream. All Lloyd could do was prevent Tammaeroth from dragging him out too early. "Just slow down for a second," he said while stopping her from rising back to her feet. "Let me see your wounds."

Criminals, dissidents, heretics, and even a few daedra who hadn't been mobbed all ran out, moving with such a frantic pace that a few of the wooden steps were broken. Tammaeroth shook her head at him. "We can worry about that later, let's just go," she panted, swatting at a small Bosmer skooma junkie who'd run too closely to them while escaping.

"We can't jump right in the middle of all of this ruckus." He pointed toward the crowd of escapees pushing and shoving. "Just let me take a look for a moment."

"You can heal me later, Lloyd!"

"I can't! I lost all my restoration magic!"

"What do you mean you lost it?!"

"Saline made me forget; that was part of the deal to stop you from slipping into the Void." She shuddered at his reply, and he tried to change the subject. "It's okay, I have no regrets. And at least my fire magic still exists - in you. Did you even realize that you just killed Druinald with it?"��She tilted her head at him. "I forgot my flame spells a long time…" She paused, and her eyes widened. "How do I…wait, why do I remember it all?"��"Because it's mine; that was also a part of the deal. It's an opportunity to do some heavy reading in the near future, but for now, the important point is that we'll have to rely on first aid." He pulled her breastplate back, finding her far more pliant than she'd been on the night they'd met. "Your stab wounds are deep, but the bleeding has slowed. You'll need stitches, but we don't have time for that now."

By the time they'd finished talking, the last of the surviving prisoners had escaped, leaving behind a dilapidated wooden staircase. "We can - and must - go now. Where's the Seducer?" Tammaeroth asked.

"She's over here - Nurana, stop screwing around!"

Nurana had been removing every torch sconce around them and flinging it into the supply storage. "Trust me, I was ready to leave a long time ago!" She hurried over to them and actually offered her hand to Tammaeroth, who looked at her skeptically. “I don’t like you either, sourpuss, but only an idiot rejects a comrade in battle.”

Reluctantly, Tammaeroth accepted Nurana’s hand, and both of them helped the Dremora stand and walk up the stairs. Her calves were still hurt from the torture, and Druinald had cut her up badly during the fight; walking fast proved to be easy with Lloyd and Nurana on either side of her but would have been impossible otherwise.

On their way out, Lloyd glanced off of the platform. Though Nurana had removed many of the torches from the walls on their way there, the entire cavern was now alight with flames as the wooden portions of the makeshift cell blocks burned. The temperature was incredibly hot, and by the time they’d exited through the door and into the ramp leading out, they’d all begun to sweat. Bodies from guards they’d killed on the way in had already been looted by the previous escapees, the last of whom they saw in front of them as they left the fake warehouse. When they reached the door, the ground shook beneath their feet.

“How can a fire cause a ground quake?” Lloyd wondered out loud.

Nurana waited until they were outside in the morning air to answer. “Probably because I set their alchemy storage on fire.”

Her statement took a moment to register. “Wait, what?” he asked, doing a double take as the ground thundered beneath them.

All of a sudden, the warehouse behind them erupted, flinging them forward a few feet due to the force of the underground explosion. Though the sound was muffled enough not to burst their eardrums, it was still painfully loud, and the trio ran into the nearest bush on instinct. The ground continued to rumble behind them, and they climbed upwards toward a hill in the treeline before turning around. Wood and metal cracked as the warehouse collapsed in on itself, falling into a sinkhole created by the subterranean alchemical explosion. The edges of the sinkhole were surprisingly even, as if a giant had cut the hole into the ground with a smooth shovel, giving them a clean view of just how long and deep the cavern had been. The devastation stretched on for a quarter of a mile, with rubble and trees still tumbling down into the sinkhole even once it had settled.

Ever so slowly, Nurana turned back to look at them with a devilish grin plastered on her devilish face. “Oops,” she chortled as if a massive explosion hadn’t just engulfed an entire building.

“You maniac,” Lloyd said, his voice tinged with both shock and awe.

Having likely seen many such events in her lifetime, Tammaeroth wasn’t fazed by the incredible site. “There’s not much smoke, but there will be delivery parties and messengers here on normal business by noon,” she said, taking a breath afterward. “We need to get to Shimmerene.”

“There’s a place we can stop at on the way; it’s empty of people, but there’s water and some food left,” Nurana replied.

“We…can talk about that on the way,” Lloyd said, wary of returning to a crime scene. “Let’s just get the supplies we hid in the bushes and get out of here. We can talk once we find a good hiding spot.”


	86. An So Begins the Awkward Silences

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Commence tense and loaded small talk in three...two...one...

That night, the trio settled down in the wilderness northeast of Alinor, not far from the lonesome inn for which they were headed. Once they’d set up camp in a sufficiently secluded spot in the woods, partially shielded by the underbrush, Lloyd had explained to Tammaeroth the exact nature of their new connection. Nurana had disappeared to gather firewood and berries at some point, leaving the original duo to talk. Tammaeroth had initially listened to the full story of what had occurred and then fell silent. Lloyd took the opportunity to redress her wounds with the last set of bandages they’d pilfered from the inn.

As he finished pinning the last bandage closed with a sharpened twig, he sat next to her and watched the dying campfire. “I’m glad you’re back,” he said softly.

The flames created light which danced over her dark features, revealing an almost beatific expression on her face. If he’d seen her look so peaceful before, then he couldn’t remember when. “I’m glad to be back…for now,” she replied. She sounded like she were fully present in the conversation, but there was a wistful tone in her voice that he wouldn’t have thought a demonic being capable of.

“Do you blame me?” he asked. “For the curse Saline put on you?”

Her reaction was slow, worrying him greatly when he wondered about her answer. The words came out so naturally, though, that he trusted they were honest. “It’s not a curse.”

“You understand that when I eventually die, you’ll follow my soul wherever it goes, right? Even into Aetherius, like how your clan was permanently killed?”

That beatific look on her face both reassured and scared him at the same time. “Such an end befits me…it’s poetic justice,” she replied without anxiety or fear. “Permanent death isn’t on the mind of normal daedra, but I’m not normal. Not anymore. Everybody I was close to, the equivalent of my family if I can borrow the mortal analogy, were lost forever that way. I’ve thought about the prospect far more than a daedra usually does. I won’t like it, but I see the appropriateness.” She turned to look at him and rested her hand on his shoulder - a warm hand now full of life. “If It has to end that way, then I’m glad it will be with you. You’re my only clan now.”

He smiled and looked down, sincerely flattered. “I’m honored to be a part of your clan,” he replied, noticing the way she ran her thumb over the meat of his shoulder. He looked back up and considered leaning in, but Nurana returned too soon, and Tammaeroth removed her hand out of shyness.

“I got more food, and more kindling,” the Seducer said while tossing the firewood directly into the campfire.

Although the Breton and the Dremora behaved naturally, Nurana looked them over as she stored the berries with the rest of their provisions and then turned to sit on the opposite side of the campfire. “Nurana,” Lloyd said, causing her to reluctantly pause. “Could you come over here? I could use your help bringing her up to speed on the inn we’ll be staying at.”

The two daedra paused and avoided each other’s gazes like two territorial animals wishing to avoid a costly fight. The tension was palpable, and they both likely realized that he was pushing them to make peace with one another, but Nurana relented and sat in front of them anyway, forming a triangle on one side of the fire. Not willing to let them avoid dealing with each other awkwardly, Lloyd pushed the conversation along.

“You know, she’s been very helpful and provides a sobering outlook,” he told Tammaeroth, pretending that he didn’t notice said tension. “I don’t think I would have dealt with the problem we faced at that inn without her there.” He tilted his head at Nurana, and he felt that familiar tug in his core of a demonic thrall resisting his order.

As he continued doing so over time, though, he found that he could be more subtle and less forceful when pushing her to do things she normally wouldn’t. Slow like a jogger wearing lead shoes, Nurana turned to face toward Tammaeroth without looking at her. “We faced a problem at the inn,” she said mechanically.

Though similarly uncomfortable, Tammaeroth was less recalcitrant without needing to be pushed. “What type of problem?” she asked with a measure of feigned disinterest.

“A problem from the owners.”

“What type of problem from the owners?” Tammaeroth asked, causing Nurana to sneer for a moment.

“They threatened to contact law officers.”

“What did you do to solve the problem?” Tammaeroth asked again, and Nurana seemed to be running toward her limit on sneers, tuts, and eye rolls she had for the night.

“I convinced Lloyd that we had to kill them all.”

Tammaeroth did a double take, legitimately surprised. She glanced over at Lloyd with a look of approval on her face which made him feel guilty. Her nature was demonic like Nurana’s, and he didn’t fault her for her natural instinct, but he didn’t think of himself as a killer. When Tammaeroth turned back to Nurana, however, a great deal of the problems which had occurred between them seemed forgiven.

“Nice,” the Dremora said.

The Seducer did a double take of her own. Her face moved from skeptical to extremely disturbed at receiving a complement from a person she’d once mocked and nearly killed, but she didn’t reject the comment. The night was filled with a less awkward silence.


	87. A Crowded House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or in this case, a crowded inn full of dead bodies.

When the trio arrived at the lonesome inn the next day, they’d spent a good half hour scouting the place just to be sure that no interlopers had entered the premises. To their relief, the gate on the picket fence out front hadn’t been opened, and the chickens had escaped from the coops and fled. After a few moments of panicked searching, they even found the keys to the building in the backpacks they’d stolen, allowing them to access the traveler’s motel, drop all of their gear by the door, and lock it behind them. Before they could even search the interior for intruders, their olfactory senses were assaulted by the odor of decaying corpses.

“My word, that’s unspeakable,” Lloyd said upon entering. He immediately tried to walk down the hall to escape the smell, but both daedra stopped him at first.

“Wait, you don’t know who’s here!” Nurana said while grabbing his cloak.

“I need to search the place first!” Tammaeroth said while blocking his path.

The two creatures from Oblivion glared at each other for a moment as if they were competing to see who could be the better bodyguard. Although neither of them seemed that agitated yet, he knew they both possessed catlike movements he wouldn’t be able to prevent, at least not before they seriously hurt each other. As loathe as he was to stand in the middle of such a confrontation, he had little other choice.

“Tammy, I need you to search down the hall while Nurana searches the kitchen. I’ll be fine here at the door; it’s locked and the ‘closed’ sign hasn’t been disturbed. If this floor is cleared, then we can search upstairs, too.”

The two of them both ignored him, facing each other but then looking away like two people who knew a real fight would cost too much for them both. Refusing to let the previous night’s more amiable atmosphere sway her, however, Nurana turned her nose up.

“Well, I already know my way around the kitchen; we’ll be waiting for you whenever you’re done,” she said pompously before turning on her heels and marching into the kitchen, totally unfazed by the stench of dead meat.

“It’s not a competition! It’s…” his voice trailed off when he realized that she wasn’t listening to him. When he turned the other way, all he saw was Tammaeroth’s backside as she hurried down the hall to barge into every room aggressively. It only took a few minutes of banging around before the both sped back to him, and he felt thankful that they happened to be in the off season for travelers on that road. “Alright, this next part needs teamwork, okay? I want the two of you to help each other search upstairs. Everyone needs to support each other, understand?”

Once again turning it into a competition, Nurana walked down the other, much shorter hall toward the stairs. “Whenever she’s ready,” she said without addressing Tammaeroth directly. The two of them ran up the stairs, and he wondered for a few moments if he’d have to supervise them. He didn’t, to his relief, and they searched upstairs in silence for a few minutes before coming back down. “Anything?”

“Nothing,” they both replied, competing to see who could answer first.

Fortunately, the past day had given him time to consider a rough plan, and since Nurana was on extra good behavior, he was able to speak without being interrupted. “Good, we have some time to prepare before we move on to Shimmerene. I have a rough plan to help us along the way; I think everyone involved will like it. Saline left me with the ability to summon…less martial helpers, if temporarily. I’m thinking that they can dispose of the corpses, prepare us some proper enchanted gear, and even earn us some extra coin. What I need from the two of you is to search the kitchen for any foodstuff and cutlery that we should keep, and then the bedrooms for what we need to sleep tonight. Is that alright with the two of you?”

Unused to the concept of consent, Nurana pondered his question for too long. “Absolutely,” Tammaeroth replied first, going into the kitchen.

“Huh? You don’t know what’s in the kitchen, let me take a look first!” Nurana said to Tammaeroth, ignoring him while following her behind the reception counter.

Once he was alone in the lobby, he was able to focus on his newfound spells. Conjuring the new minions felt unnatural since he hadn’t learned the incantations honestly, but it worked all the same, and the dreary, world-weary Dremora butler appeared in front of him all the same.

“Ah, master. More cups and plates for me to carry?” the Butler asked with unfeigned disinterest.

Lloyd pulled the keys from his belt. “Nice to see you again, too,” the Breton replied, though his sarcasm was lost on the superior cynic. “What I have for you today is more exciting: three dead bodies in the kitchen. Please bury them in the bushes out back and then clean up the mess in the kitchen. Feel free to use anything you find in here, and let me know when you’re done.”

The butler from Oblivion took the keys blithely. “Of course,” the thin Dremora sighed.

As the butler left, Lloyd tapped into that unnaturally gained spell repository of his mind again and pulled a much more pliant minion into Mundus. In a flash, the Dremora merchant appeared in front of him, quickly surveying his surroundings without the usual disorientation associated with inter dimensional travel. “Greetings, master. You have many things I’d like to buy, this time,” the merchant crooned.

“Hello there, friend! I’m glad that you like what you see around you. There might be a number of antiques you could find customers for in Oblivion, if you’re interested.”

The merchant’s smile was legitimate and sincere, at least, as much as a businessman’s smile could be. “Let’s make a deal!”

“I like the sound of that!” Lloyd replied just as enthusiastically, and the two of them started to synergize. “Let me start with what I need to keep: Tammaeroth and Nurana are sorting food and a bit of bedding, which we need. That butler has a bloody mess in the kitchen to clean up, too. Plus, we need to keep the curtains on the windows here in case anybody comes snooping around. Aside from that, anything you want - literally anything - is yours. I trust your prices, so have at it.”

“I can hardly wait,” the merchant said with just as much gusto. “Are you looking for coinage, or anything else you need?”

“A bit of both. I need some soul gems - common is fine - as well as a bit of cash. Let’s say a 75 - 25 split between soul gems and cash, whenever you’re ready.”

“I’m on it. I’ll start upstairs since the kitchen seems rather busy,” the merchant said, taking his leave once Lloyd gave him the nod.

His ego gratified by commanding so many minions to a degree he wouldn’t admit, Lloyd grinned to himself while summoning one last such daedra. Rehala’s short, well-dressed form appeared, along with her foldable table in one hand and a classy briefcase in the other. Unlike the rest of his summons, she was wary of him, staying quiet like she wasn’t quite used to him yet. He maintained a respectful distance away so as not to startle her.

“Greetings, Rehala, and welcome back to Nirn.”

Perhaps remembering his emotional outburst in the Thalmor prison, she withheld any reaction she may have felt. “Hello,” she replied hesitantly, looking like she might flee if he raised his hand or made a sudden movement.

“I’m glad that you’re here. I have a few tasks which I think you’d be particularly suited for. Are you ready?”

She waited a few seconds as if he hadn’t finished speaking. “Alright,” she answered after the delay.

“Excellent. Right now, that merchant fellow is clearing out the second floor of this building. It’s secure, by the way. He has instructions on a number of common soul gems to supply based on the value of what he finds upstairs. That’s where you come in.” Lloyd pulled a tattered, magical robe from one of the backpacks by the door. “This is one of my enchantments. I could reproduce it myself, but I may not have the time. Take a look at it.”

Rehala set her briefcase down and held the robe between her fingers. “There’s an illusion on it,” she said, focusing intently and feeling more at ease once she was introduced to enchanting work. “Like chameleon, but not exactly.”

“Yes, some of my own handiwork. The wearer will be ignored by others unless there’s a strong impetus to find the specific individual beneath the fabric. Can you copy the enchantment onto these?” He pulled a few more pilfered robes, some from the inn and some from the prison, out of the backpack, and she took all the garments and draped them over her shoulders.

“I can with the proper gems. Is that my task?” she asked.

“Indeed. Work on those three robes as quickly as you can manage without sacrificing quality. Pick any empty room upstairs as your workspace, and work through the night. If, and only if, you finish those, then we have a few weapons which could use enchanting as well.”

“Okay thank you,” Rehala replied in a single breath, scurrying off upstairs with her hands full of equipment.

Finally free from manual work for the first time in a long time, Lloyd took a deep breath in the lobby and wondered what to do with himself. He couldn’t remember what it felt like to have so little on his mind, and he began to wonder if the bedroom he’d stayed at a few days ago still had books on a shelf. Before he could consider the thought further, though, he plopped down on a plain wooden chair in one corner of the lobby and leaned far back, letting his head loll back and face the ceiling. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t able to nod off before he heard the sound of yelling come from the kitchen.

“Stop eating all the biscuits, you fatass!” Nurana yelled at Tammaeroth. A second later, a deep thud was heard, followed by an even deeper and louder sound as objects were knocked around. “Llllllloooooooyyyyyddd!” she yelled again when the scuffling didn’t stop.

“You have got to be kidding me,” he sighed to himself without even opening his eyes.

He wasn’t even able to wallow in denial because the Dremora butler ran into the lobby, apoplectic and sweating. “Master, they’re striking each other physically! I don’t know what to do!”

“Just go clean the bathing room until I’m finished,” Lloyd replied, dragging himself to a standing position and suddenly feeling a hundred years older. Despite knowing that both daedra were capable of seriously hurting each other, he found it difficult to speed up on his way to the kitchen, and by the time he arrived he found the two of them grappling on the ground knocking over stools and racks of potatoes. “Come on, break it up! Stop!” he shouted, surprising himself upon realization that it was the first time he’d ever raised his voice at Tammaeroth. She released the rear naked choke she’d slapped onto Nurana immediately, and she even rose to stand at attention like her counterpart despite having been so assertive with Lloyd previously. The power of the binding spell scared him for the sake of whatever humility he had left. Nurana opened her mouth to begin blaming Tammaeroth, but she remained silent when she saw that Lloyd was tired and upset. “I don’t want to know what it was; I just want to know what it will take for this to work. Like it or not, we have to work as a team - at least until Shimmerene - for all of our sakes.”

“It’s a lot longer than just to Shimmerene, Lloyd!” Nurana protested petulantly. “We’re stuck together!”

Tammaeroth scowled at her, flashing an aggression which he hadn’t seen from her since they’d been attacked on the first night. “Not necessarily. We’re tied to his soul, but he isn’t tied to our vestiges. You could always be sent back to Coldharbour and spend the next century wondering whether he’s near death or not.”

Nurana’s eyes flew open wide, and he saw that legitimate fear well up inside of her as it had before. He tilted his head at Tammaeroth, and she surely noticed, but she didn’t react to his judgment. “Let’s…not think like that for the time being,” he said, though they both seemed lost to him at that point. “I need…I order both of you not to fight anymore. We’re going to need each other’s support if we’re to make it through this…everything comes one step at a time. Is that understood?”

“Yes,” Tammaeroth said readily, showing no reticence to the sudden role reversal in their relationship.

“Yeah,” Nurana said afterward, her mood visibly deflated.

“Alright, then. I’m going to search the rest of the inn for things we might want to take with us…please finish salvaging food, and please do your best to get along. We’re almost through this.”

Neither of the two daedra made eye contact with each other as they returned to work, and Lloyd left the kitchen to just be somewhere else. In the back of his mind, he’d known for the past few days that the two would meet and interact eventually, but he hadn’t thought this far ahead to figure out how he’d keep the peace between them.


	88. Concordance Before Travel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mysteriously and without explanation, then tension melts away.
> 
> (There is an explanation.)

After a long night, Lloyd woke up on the second floor of the inn, on a random bedroll he’d thrown down in one of the empty rooms. He couldn’t remember when exactly he’d fallen asleep, but he did remember assisting Rehala with the enchantments until he’d felt too drowsy to stand. The shimmering chime of such a magical construct settling in to an object woke him up, giving him a jolt when he realized that he didn’t know what time it was. The fact that he needed to stretch, though, implied that he’d taken more than an evening nap.

Out in the small common study on the second floor, the found Rehala still busy at work at her portable Chironasium, hunched over on a stool with poor posture. The area was flooded with light from the window, and Lloyd realized that he’d been asleep all night.

“Good morning,” he told Rehala as he approached. “It seems that I missed a bit of the process.” He pointed to the three robes now humming with his familiar style of enchantment.

“I’ve been working for the whole nine hours you were sleeping,” she said with a sense of pride as she obsessively analyzed every inch of the fabric. “That was after the three hours I spent with your assistance.”

“That’s excellent work. It usually takes me a full working day to enchant one garment.”

“I can’t create new enchantments, but I can copy very well,” Rehala said, rather stereotypically as a daedra.

“I can see that, and the results look good.” She beamed at the complement, not fearing him anymore because she almost forgot she was talking to another person and not herself; her obsessive focus on her work caused her to hesitate before letting go of one of the robes so he could inspect it. “Yes, this is finely crafted. I can see us working together well.” She curtsied to him without speaking, and he took the cue from her laconic nature to get down to further business. “That merchant is gone, but I left the butler downstairs. If you could, tell him that I need him to pack these away with the rest of our things before I dismiss him. Consider yourself dismissed once you do so.”

“Thank you,” she said, abruptly packing up her briefcase and table before taking her leave.

While she disappeared, Lloyd took one last walk around the second floor, noting that the merchant had bought everything except for the bedroll, which Lloyd left since they already had enough. When he went downstairs, he smelled food in the kitchen but stopped by the door to bid farewell to the butler. Rehala had already dematerialized back into Apocrypha due to Lloyd’s command.

“Good morning, master,” the butler said while folding the last of their travel gear near the backpacks. “I polished your companions’ armor and left it behind the reception counter; everything else is here. Breakfast is waiting on the kitchen counter.”

“Great work, and good morning to you too. I trust that the enchantress delivered the news to you?”

“Yes, that I’m dismissed once I finish this. If that order still stands, then-“

In the middle of his sentence, the butler finished packing without realizing it, and the binding from Lloyd’s command caused the dreary Dremora to automatically phase back to Apocrypha in a purple flash of light. Chuckling at the suddenness of the inter dimensional warp, Lloyd shook his head and walked around the hall on the bottom floor. Every room there had also been cleared out by the merchant, though he could hear Nurana cussing at the bathtub from behind the closed bathing room door. Leaving the demon to exorcise her demons, he walked in to the kitchen only to find Tammaeroth alone on a chair in the now spotless food preparation area, wrapped in a towel and wearing pillowcases as slippers. Her wet hair spilled over one shoulder, and she didn’t notice him enter at first due to her focus on the eggs and toast she was eating.

“Hey,” he said while sitting on a chair across a small table from her.

She swallowed her food quickly as usual and smiled at him. “Hey,” she replied while offering him her food instead of pulling a fresh plate from the counter. “You slept early last night.”

“I think all the traveling caught up to me. But how do you feel? You told me two days ago that you didn’t feel like yourself.”

She hummed in confirmation but looked down at the table for a moment. “Yes, the effect of dying. I didn’t fall into the Void, but I was still medically dead for a while. I feel better now, in terms of motor skills.”

“Emotionally?” he asked softly. “Are you okay?”

She looked back up at him and laughed lightly, brushing off the concern. “I’m better now than I’ve been in a longer time than you know.”

That rare moment of eye contact was comforting, and he didn’t notice any signs of trauma like he’d seen when healing other mortals who’d been severely injured. The warmth she radiated was different from the fiery rage she showed when protecting him, and he reached for her hand without thinking, wanting to excise memories of the coldness he’d felt when her body had been dead in a jail cell.

Just as she had uncurled her fingers, another pair of footsteps approached, and they both pulled away from each other shyly. Nurana walked into the kitchen, similarly dressed in a bath towel and pillowcases she’d wrapped around her feet as house slippers. Unaware of what she’d interrupted, she sat at the side of the table next to both of them, taking the rest of the breakfast food to the table with her. Tammaeroth stared at her plate awkwardly, leaving Nurana to press her stale silence onto their shoulders. The tension from the previous night was bizarrely and inexplicably absent, however.

“Good morning,” she said to them both as she started nibbling at her food at her usual snail’s pace.

“Hey, good morning,” Lloyd replied, acting as casual as he could. Tammaeroth didn’t return the greeting, though. “Did you sleep well?”

“Deeply but never enough,” the Seducer replied while nursing the food on her plate. Turning away from him abruptly, she took the strawberries from her plate and put them in front of Tammaeroth, who backed away as if they were poisoned. “These are naturally sweet. They’re pretty good.”

Shyly as she’d been when she’d first met Lloyd, Tammaeroth looked the other way, pretending to play with her wet hair until a few strands obscured her face. “True,” she replied stiffly.

Nurana wouldn’t leave her alone. “I saw them and thought of you while you were in the bath this morning. I think you’ll like them.”

Lloyd flexed his jaw to stop it from dropping open. Nurana hadn’t even been that polite to him when she’d been reaching out to him, and here she was giving a gift to a person whom she’d taken turns trying to outright murder. The sight was touching, in an unholy and stabby kind of way. Tammaeroth eyed them pensively for five seconds before accepting them.

“Thank,” the Dremora replied while popping the first one into her mouth. Lloyd watched them both in awe before finishing his own breakfast. When he went to take a bath himself, he was no longer plagued by the anxious worry that they’d turn on each other as soon as he’d turn his back.


	89. A Functional Team Begins to Grow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Days spent camping and hiking with the same people can force them to either get along or kill each other. The former is preferable.

Two days in to their journey through the wilderness, they stopped to camp in a narrow glen tucked into the hills near Summerset’s main road. Once the two daedra learned to get along, they formed a rather efficient team; Nurana had stalked and then shocked a nest full of pheasants with the spells she’d leeched from Lloyd, and Tammaeroth cooked their meal with hers. As opposed to their previous travels wherein they’d aimed to survive on as little food and drink as possible, this time they actually ate until they were all full.

A form of serenity descended on them after the meal, and they all stared at the campfire for a while. One of them would have to stay up on first watch while the other two slept, but none of them were in a rush to decide on that just yet. Though his two thralls didn’t exactly behave like friends, there was no more tension in their interactions, and Lloyd no longer found himself spying on them just in case he’d have to intervene and stop another conflict. Comfortable in their arrangement and not in the mood to worry about the future, he picked up the refuse from their meal and left to bury it and then wash his hands in the slight trickle of water at the other end of the glen.

By the time he’d returned, he found a most curious sight. Nurana was already laying in one of the bedrolls inside their tent, ready to sleep, while Tammaeroth was armed and sitting next o the tent flap. And they were actually *chatting* with each other. He was so surprised that he hung back amid the underbrush and watched the end of their conversation.

“Haft weapons don’t pose an issue if we can cast wall spells, though,” Nurana said sleepily yet with sustained interest.

Tammaeroth nodded to whatever they’d been discussing. “Yes, a short wall spell would negate the need for a shield; the vulnerability associated with a mace or axe’s center of gravity disappears.”

“We should have time to practice at some point. It would be better,” Nurana added. For a few seconds the conversation lulled into the sort of awkward silence when they both felt is over but didn’t want to appear uninterested. Then, Nurana added the real surprise. “You’re not a loser, Tammy.”

A sappy smile spread across Lloyd’s face from his vantage point, though Tammaeroth only looked down shyly. “Thank,” she replied demurely.

If the word ‘cute’ could ever be used to describe inter dimensional demonic beings, then it would have fit the two of them at that moment. Satisfied that he could rest easy, he stepped on a few twigs as he approached to alert them to his presence and then joined in the chatter for a few minutes before sleeping.


	90. They Finally Reach the Portal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After one hell of a trip from Alinor, they finally reach Shimmerene. Their movements have been observed, however.

By the time they could see the environs of Shimmerene over the horizon, they’d counted roughly six days from the time they’d escaped the Thalmor prison. Even for three healthy and physically fit people, the journey was wearing on them. Rather than rushing to reach their destination once it was in view, the trio actually slowed down, conserving as much energy as they could on their way to the location which marked their exit.

“That’s it, isn’t it? Those hills are the last on the map west of Shimmerene,” Nurana panted, less acclimated to the physics and physiology of life on Nirn.

Having lived on the plane for a decade or so once, Tammaeroth was winded but not wiped out. “Yes, we’re almost at the end here,” she said while they continued walking. “This is where I first re-entered Mundus. I remember the spot exactly: at the end of a little gulley under two trees.”

“And you’re sure the portal will open?” Nurana asked with more than a little concern.

“Yes, it will when he’s present,” Tammaeroth replied while nudging Lloyd with her elbow.

“How did Saline make it like that?” Lloyd asked.

“I don’t know how he does these things; he just utters curses and promises, and they’re kept.”

“And you’re sure it will work?” Nurana asked again.

Tammaeroth paused for a moment, causing both the Breton and the Seducer to wait with baited breath. “It has to. Lord Mora is capable of misguiding the foolish, but his servants aren’t; neither Seekers, nor Watchers, nor even Lurkers or his other servants, are capable of deceit.” She paused again, and nobody else spoke. “It has to work.”

They walked for a few more minutes, descending among the uneven, hilly landscape to the west of Shimmerene. A comforting sense of accomplishment settled in, and the silence was a pleasant one for its duration.

“Do you have any regrets?” Lloyd asked them both, wondering out loud.

Despite having been the socially awkward one, Tammaeroth was unfazed by the question, unlike Nurana. “In life? Many,” she chortled, truly at ease. “About this? About everything that’s happened here on Summerset? Not a single one.”

He smiled and glanced down while they walked. “Me neither.”

Knowing that she’d be expected to answer even if they weren’t looking at her, the most prideful and self-assured member of their arrangement proved surprisingly pensive. “Let’s finish this, and then I can answer,” she sighed.

Gradually, they entered a little gulley like Tammaeroth had described, and her pace slowed down a bit more while she guided them. “This is it; this is the end,” she replied, bringing them to the end of the gulley beneath two trees. A distortion in the air shimmered and pulsated like soapy water running down a window, pulsating more and more as Lloyd drew near. “We did it.”

“So this takes us into Apocrypha?” Nurana asked.

Tammaeroth shook her head. “No, not directly; that would have violated the Coldharbour Compact. Saline cut a skein into Oblivion with his voice and then dug into Mundus. I can retrace my footsteps, and then we’ll be in Apocrypha.”

“Let’s not wait any longer, then,” Lloyd said. “There’s no reason to delay-“

An excruciatingly loud whistle blew, causing all of them to duck down. Above them on the edge of a gulley, a human of some sort wearing a leather mask scanned the area. He seemed to ignore them entirely, not noticing their presence despite them being plainly visible, and instead the ragged youth pointed at the Oblivion skein. “Hey everybody, the aberration is reacting to something! We had good reason to wait!”

Tense but holding back, both daedra moved closer around Lloyd, watching the masked human on the hill above them. “He’s wearing a Stendarr pendant!” Tammaeroth whispered. “Like those idiots who tried to steal you away from the justiciars!”

“He won’t notice us if there’s something more interesting in view,” Lloyd whispered back. “Come on, let’s just go.”

Logic trumped aggression in the minds of his two demonic protectors, and with some prodding, he herded them toward the shimmer. The distortion grew, along with shouting of more non-Altmer from behind the hill, but the trio entered into the spherical distortion and felt gravity warp around them. When the sensation returned, it was coupled with darkness, and they all fell as a harrowing speed until they entered chilled air. Gravity stretched around them once again, and without even changing direction, they felt themselves being propelled forward rather than falling down. The rushing of air beneath their feet signaled the presence of a solid surface, and they all kicked and thrashed until they slowed down and planted their feet on the ground.

Even Tammaeroth was jittery despite having been there before, and Lloyd and Nurana both grabbed onto her as they tried to figure out which way was up. “Are we in?” Lloyd asked urgently.

“Yes, yes, I remember this exactly,” Tammaeroth replied.

Nurana did another one of her double takes. “Look up!”

All three of them looked above them, gasping in awe at the breadth of the Aurbis. Stars surrounded them, bleeding magic through the holes in the fabric of creation once drilled by the Magna Ge and energizing the trio in a non-physiological way. Glowing particles of Magicka residue floated in space like fireflies, and Lloyd actually held one in his hand like a snowflake. Columns of gas perhaps hundreds of miles wide floated off in the distance, unmoving in their eyes due to the distance and reminding all who could see of the rushed abandonment of Magnus’ original project.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” the Breton murmured, dumbstruck, awestruck, thunderstruck, and every other kind of struck.

“What are we standing on?” Nurana asked while pressing her boot into the ground.

“It’s an asteroid bridge,” Tammaeroth replied, pointing from their feet all the way into the darkness of the Void, where the rocky surface disappeared from view. “Don’t fall off - it will be extremely painful for you, and deadly for him,” she said, nudging Lloyd again.

“It will be painful for you all in either case,” said an unseen figure using an illusion spell to magnify his decrepit voice.

All three of them ducked again, looking down the asteroid bridge through the darkness. A number of shadowy figures were walking toward them, entering through a portal of their own. Horns and claws passed in front of the light emitted by the stars, accompanied by the scraping of metal. In front of the starlight, the exact shapes of the dozen or so stalkers came into view, all of them flanking a single feeble figure who’d been speaking.

“You can’t escape that easily, Mr. Rolsen.”


	91. Familiar Faces

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some familiar yet unwelcome faces make their comebacks. Cue references to the opening few chapters of this story.

Whatever process of rebirth Mr. Doom had undergone hadn’t been kind to him. Hunched over and leaning on both a crutch and a Scamp, the ashy Dremora was only recognizable by his voice, and even then, just barely. Steam pipes crudely copied from Dwemer designs connected his deformed body to a profane device on wheels pumping unclean air into the demon’s lungs. The unholy man’s hands were underdeveloped like that of a stillborn fetus, with the limbs ending in round lumps and a few stubs which resembled prematurely developed fingers. His horns were malformed little knubs on his forehead, which itself was the only discernible part of his face: noseless, earless, mouthless, featuring only holes for those receptacles which otherwise constituted features on a normal face. There was only one eye, and even then, it was clear, barely formed, and had a strand of flesh stretched over it like previously melted taffy. Mr. Doom’s abhorrent visage was that of a premature manbaby.

“You haven’t even been dead for even two weeks! How are you even conscious?” Lloyd asked, too shocked to wonder if he’d even receive an answer.

Oddly enough, he did. “The process of rebirth in Chaotic Creatia can be…interrupted,” Mr. Doom wheezed while his Scamp assisted him in walking. “My body wasn’t entirely reformed, but I only need my mind in tact for this…and I wouldn’t miss your failed escape for the world.”

Tammaeroth snarled at the albino Dremora and wielded her mace. “There are plenty of other mortals for you to harass; you’ll only waste more time and resources chasing this one,” she said while stepping out in front.

“How the hell did you even find us?” Lloyd asked, more curious than prepared for another uneven fight.

Laughing until he hacked and coughed up Azure Plasm, Mr. Doom seemed to derive pleasure from explaining the details of his evil plan to potential victims. “It was easy! For you have, enthralled directly by your soul, an animus which still belongs to Coldharbour,” he said while pointing to Nurana with one of his stubs; her jaw dropped and her knees shook, all of her usual bravado drained out. “You carried a beacon for us directly to you, Mr. Rolsen, and one which must know - in the end - where it belongs.” Mr. Doom then ignored the Breton and looked at the Seducer thrall with his one barely-functioning eye. “Time to come home, Nurana; we’ll be sure that the mortal’s soul is well taken care of by Lord Bal. You’ll have your home back…once you undergo the mandatory century of constant torture for your consorting with an enemy, of course.”

Nurana floundered, departing so radically from the normal pompous, nearly arrogant Seducer whom Lloyd and Tammaeroth were used to that they both stared at her openly. She opened her mouth but couldn’t talk, yet Lloyd felt no magical manipulation of her through their bound connection; her hesitation was purely psychological. In spite of all her swagger and pretentious self-confidence, the prospects of her return to Coldharbour - and the mandating of a choice between sides for her - had sapped her strength and self-esteem in a way which didn’t match her personality at all.

“Nurana,” Mr. Doom repeated, regaining a bit of the old bile his voice had held before his premature rebirth. “Remember who your oath is sworn to.”

None of Mr. Doom’s amassed henchmen and flunkies advanced, and a few of the Banekin even snickered at Nurana the way they had at Lloyd when they’d thought him as good as dead during the last encounter. They were clearly deriving entertainment from the mental distress they were causing, even to one whom they’d once considered an ally, and no mercy was spared as Mr. Doom stared at the Seducer in silence. The pain on Nurana’s face was apparent, yet he didn’t feel any tugging on their binding spell - Mr. Doom had offered her a means of rejoining without leading directly to Lloyd’s conventional death.

“Think very carefully about it,” Mr. Doom said, tempting her with the idea. “He’ll become a Soul Shriven…his soul will remain in Coldharbour forever. You’ll be safe once you serve your sentence, and so will he. We won’t need to have wasted our plane’s resources for nothing.” Stunned into silence and clearly embarrassed by what he was doing , Nurana stopped trying to speak and only shook her head at him. “You do know that the ending to this will be the same no matter what you do, yes?”

A few hostile Dark Seducers who’d been standing behind Mr. Doom strode forward. “She quite enjoyed holding a higher rank than us, didn’t she, sisters?” the first one said.

The second one grinned evilly at Nurana much in the way she once had at Lloyd, flipping Nurana into a sort of role reversal which she didn’t know how to handle. “She taught us well how to stretch a victim’s intestines out while keeping them alive,” the second one said. “I’ll enjoy practicing that once she’s a lowly Kiskengo again.”

Although Lloyd had already been to surprised by the exchange to cogently react, he became even more surprised when Tammaeroth started to move. Positioning herself in front of both himself and Nurana, she grit her teeth and took a defensive stance, shielding them both. “Oh look, the stray thinks it can protect her! Look at the likes you’re now consorting with, Nurana!” the third enemy Seducer taunted.

As if they hadn’t reached their limit of unseen strangers yelling at them, yet another voice boomed from behind them. “You’re all sentenced to death for the likes of whom you’re consorting!”

Tammaeroth continued facing down Mr. Doom’s group, but Lloyd spun around to see that the skein behind them was still open, far off in the distance. The silhouettes of hooded figures approached, revealing familiar leather masks of the Stendarr zealots from the first night.

“Are you serious?!” Lloyd asked incredulously.

Among the gang of masked Stendarr worshippers, there was a single Justiciar, young for a Summerset native and likely the gang’s inside man. “I hereby sentence every last one of you to death,” the high elf Stendarr apologist said in an overdone noble-sounding voice.

The trio huddled together on the bridge, moving into the center as the two larger groups now focused on each other. “How dare you trespass into Oblivion, Aedra spawn!” Mr. Doom wheezed at the masked zealots.

Tammaeroth nudged Lloyd again. “You have to move further down the bridge! The skein will remain open as long as you’re close to this end!” she whispered.

“There are claws and horns at the other end!” he whispered back. “We have to find a way to-“

Commotion broke out behind the Stendarr zealots as a third group entered the bridge between realms of Oblivion. Whoever had just entered began a shouting match with the Stendarr worshippers, and Mr. Doom’s daedra charged.


	92. Brawl on the Bridge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A conjured bridge of asteroids floating in the liminal barrier between planes is probably not the best place for a throwdown.

With two groups behind them preoccupied, the troubled trio turned to face the servants of Molag Bal barreling toward them. Having given up his restoration spells, Lloyd could no longer hold the flood of demons back with a ward, instead relying on the scant glass armor he’d been able to steal like Tammaeroth had. Mr. Doom hung back with his Scamp and yet another hapless mortal cultist, watching as a group of Banekin and Dremora charged.

As soon as the group drew near, Tammaeroth casted a wall of fire on the bridge, causing most of the Banekin to scatter in such a panic that the little demons fell off of the bridge. Their screams were hysterical as they plunged into the waters of Oblivion, which looked more like a miasma of heated gas and distorted pockets of space where the laws of physics were suspended. The enemy Dremora stopped short save one who fell through and found her head caved in by Tammaeroth’s mace. The mortal cultist casted a frost spell, dousing the flames and allowing the other three Dremora to continue their advance. Tammaeroth casted a cone of fire, still holding the hostile members of her race at bay. Knowing that his spell absorption would protect him, Lloyd moved forward and ignored the tongues of flame, standing unharmed as he slashed at their foes with a Thalmor arming sword. The enemy Dremora, ancient and experienced, parried his blows but began to fall back in the face of flames and a sword.

Nurana tried to cast a lightning bolt at them, but the spell fizzled out, and she shook her head rapidly as if she were dizzy. “How many extra sessions in the scathe-rings do you wish to earn?” Mr. Doom wheezed at her, breaking both her concentration and resolve. She wielded her war axe weakly in her hands, appearing entirely unprepared for a fight.

The rancor behind them grew too loud, and Lloyd turned to find that, to his horror, the Stendarr zealots were easily beaten and shoved off the bridge by a pair of familiar faces. As the masked zealots screamed all the way into the plasmodium of Oblivion, the Highus Brothers, Alinor’s most dangerous pair of smugglers, walked triumphantly toward the trio with a group of crazed, skooma-addicted base slaves behind them. Armed with dinner cutlery and crude carpenter’s tools, the literal gang which had just made short work of the figurative gang appeared more intimidating than the otherworldly demonic gang, and the trio they were stalking instinctively backed up.

“You can run anywhere you want, Rolsen, but you will pay for any disruption to our business!” one of the two smuggler brothers said, though it was difficult to tell which one in the mixture of darkness and starlight.

A battle of egos ensued between the two sides as Mr. Doom rallied his flunkies. “Choose wisely, Rolsen!” the malformed manbaby coughed. “Submit to Molag Bal and seek refuge from these ruffians - you’ll not regret your decision!”

Thinking fast, Lloyd pulled Tammaeroth and Nurana close to him. “We can cut our way through but we need to get out from the middle. Let’s play along,” he whispered while pulling his two protectors further toward the hostile daedra.

“Yes, just like that! Submit to your new master!” Mr. Doom cackled and then coughed, clearing his throat nastily before he could speak again. “I knew we could count on Nurana!”

Though he wasn’t even focusing on tormenting them anymore, Mr. Doom’s comment proved to be too much for the conflicted Seducer. Without any magical status effects, the weight of his words pressed down on Nurana beyond what she could bear, and her knees buckled.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered to Lloyd and Tammaeroth both.

“Don’t listen to him!” Tammaeroth whispered back.

“I’m so sorry, I led them right to us,” Nurana repeated, not even listening anymore.

“Spare us the chit chat about lords and masters; the only master is this,” said one of the Highus brothers as he held up a flask of particularly potent skooma. The enslaved addicts all stared at it in awe. “Go get it!” the smuggler kingpin said while flinging the flask right at Mr. Doom’s mortal cultist.

Braying like donkeys, the addicted thugs all charged headlong down the bridge, causing such a ruckus that Mr. Doom’s henchmen crouched defensively and wouldn’t strike out at people whom they otherwise would have mocked as ‘mere mortals.’ Wild-eyed and mentally impaired, the drug fiends moved as a single mass so imposing that even Mr. Doom didn’t notice when Lloyd, Tammaeroth, and Nurana fled right past him.

“Show them what true subjugation means,” Mr. Doom rasped, but in a matter of seconds, the initial stampede of mortal drug addicts completely broke the tight formation of his soldiers. “No, not like that!”

Mostly Bosmer, the skooma fiends fought dirty and ignored bodily harm. Trampling over the enemy Dremora, the addicts slipped kitchen knives in gaps within the daedric plate armor and wrapped themselves around the limbs of their enemies to slow them down. Many of the addicts died outright, but those that didn’t were truly horrific people, with one of the diminutive wood elves even twisting a Dremora’s helmet off, grabbing the demon by the horns, and biting its nose off in a disgusting display of depravity that nearly broke the morale of the millennia-old demons. The addicts were struck down, but they continued pushing the daedra back, a single lone junkie even continuing to fight after her right arm had been cut off by a daedric blade. The Dremora whose nose had been bitten off was tackled by two druggies, causing all three of them to plunge off the bridge and to their deaths. The two Highus brothers continued walking down the bridge at an even pace, casual and unperturbed by the violence surrounding them. Even Mr. Doom was intimidated by them.

A stray Scamp noticed the Breton and his two daedric thralls sneaking away and screeched in alarm. Lloyd snapped the smelly beastie’s neck, but everyone present took notice of the escape. In a moment of brilliance, the mortal cultist picked up the flask and threw it at Tammaeroth, granting the skooma junkies a new focus. “Lloyd, keep going!” she yelled while raising her mace - and not a second too soon, as an Imperial junkie had already leapt at her, meeting the hilt of her weapon with his jaw.

“Not without you!” Lloyd yelled back, striding forward and cutting down the Molag Bal cultist. Tammaeroth shrieked at him in frustration, but he didn’t listen, retracing their steps on the asteroid bridge. The skooma addicts ignored him, going for Tammaeroth instead, but his heart held no fear for her when he heard the sound of her roasting the addicts alive.

Both of the Highus brothers began walking toward him on the bridge with a quickened pace, wielding crude morning stars intended to maim rather than kill. “We’re going to hang you in the town square of Shimmerene, Rolsen. Even the Thalmor will know who sets the rules,” said one of them.

Between him and the two brothers were two Dremora still recovering from the junkie attack. Despite being visibly shaken and bested by mortals, the two servants of Molag Bal intervened. “The Breton comes with us!” one of the two Dremora yelled. When it came down to the confrontation, however, the two daedra were hurt and fatigued, while the two uncouth Altmer were well-rested and unintimidated. “Yyyeeeeeaaaarrrggghh!” the same Dremora screamed when one of the two brothers hit him so hard that he fell off the bridge.

In a miniature cycle of violence, the second Dremora tried to knock one of the brothers off, but he was too tired. Unable to fight them off, they both proceeded to beat the living shit out of him with their morning stars. The daedric plate armor protected from rusty nails but not the blunt force trauma, and the enemy Dremora was reduced to a whimpering pulp as the Highus brothers tenderized him through his armor.

Before Lloyd could intervene, he heard psychotic snickering behind him, and turned to find more immediately relevant chaos on the bridge. Mr. Doom was down, having fallen along with the contraption which kept him breathing; Nurana’s axe was buried in his head and his Scamp was nowhere to be seen. Beyond them, Tammaeroth struggled to peel the last drug addicts off of her but seemed to be in nowhere near the danger of poor Nurana. The three other Dark Seducers had surrounded her, likely acting out revenge fantasies harbored since the time they’d been under her command. Nurana had regained the fortitude to cleave Mr. Doom’s skull in half, but she had been mobbed by her apparently weaker compatriots, shoving them off of her and knocking them back but eventually being stricken to one knee from repeated cheap shots.

Lloyd rushed toward them, stepping on the dead Molag Bal cultist as a stepping stone to lunge at Nurana’s tormentors. The enemy Seducers noticed, but not before he cut one of them on the arm with his sword badly enough to disable her. Tammaeroth shook the last insane Bosmer off of her and tossed the flask back at the Highus brothers, sending the addicts scrambling past everyone. The enemy Seducers rose to face down Tammaeroth, who was ready but haggard after dealing with the skooma addicts.

With no end to the fight in sight, Lloyd wondered how many more people would be pushed off the bridge before their dangerous game ended. The screams of the enemy Dremora behind him became shrill and then high pitched and quiet in desperation, implying that the Highus Brothers would lose interest shortly. A battle of attrition wasn’t an attractive prospect when the stakes were so high.

With the Seducers held at bay but not backing down, the Breton had a moment to reach into his Magicka pool again. Trying to call on Saline one last time, he felt his conjuration slip beyond his control at the end, or be pulled beyond his control, and fly out into a region of Oblivion he couldn’t even sense. His entire reserve of Magicka was expect in a second, leaving him light headed and confused by what had hijacked his attempt. The imprint of Saline, unique like that of every summoned minion, was absent, and Lloyd realized that summoning beings from Oblivion wouldn’t work properly when he was already in Oblivion.

But there was something…a responder. He didn’t know what. And as the fight died down on the bridge, the response became apparent to everybody when the rock pillar holding up the asteroid bridge quaked and began to crack.


	93. The Bridge Collapses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They fought off a cult, a coven of demons, and drug smugglers, but a collapsing dimensional bridge proves to be too much.

The skooma addicts were the first to fall down, easily losing their balance as they wrestled in a maul for the flask. The quake was audible even within the blackness of the universe, reaching them from a point beneath what Tammaeroth had referred to as the waters of Oblivion. A deep crack broke out so systematically that its path could be followed visually, breaking into the very ground they were standing on. Everybody who was not addicted to drugs fell silent.

That silence was punctuated only by the fluctuating waves of colored plasma below them and the screeching of the skooma fiends when the flask appeared to be empty. Everyone else waited for a moment to see if another tremor would come. And it did.

“Shit!” one of the smuggler brothers exclaimed when the entire bridge shook again.

An ominous cracking sound echoed like thunder in the star-marked blackness of the Void. This time, the movement they felt wasn’t from a tremor, but rather a slight tilting as the entire bridge began to fall apart into sections.

Everyone screamed, even the Highus Brothers, when the bridge began to tip over to the side. When one of the many pillars holding up the bridge broke off and collapsed into the swirling darkness of the Void, any notion of armed conflict ceased.

“It’s not supposed to collapse while we’re here!” Tammaeroth shouted, kneeling and bracing herself on the bridge thereafter.

Before anybody could answer, the rocky pillars groaned separately from the bridge, which itself began to rise. Gravity tugged deep in everyone’s core as the bridge floated away independently of the pillars which had been supporting it, or at least their portion of the bridge - pieces of it were breaking off at both ends. The unconscious Molag Bal cultist was the first to fall, sliding off due to the angle and falling to his doom. Speaking of which, the pieces of Mr. Doom’s body slid off next.

“Climb to the side!” Lloyd yelled out loud, clinging to the edge of the bridge which turned into the top as the rock structure was moved around. One of the Highus Brothers fell as well, knocking one of their skooma fiends off with him.

Higher and higher the bridge was raised, losing another chunk at one end due to the instability of its own weight. A flash of grey passed by as the Dark Seducers all began to lose their grip and fall. Nurana crawled away but cried out when one of her former allies grabbed her by the ankle, dragging her into the Void with them. Not even bothering to look for help, Nurana merely grabbed on to a parapet on the bridge and clung to it like a security blanket. The bridge was beginning to sway in addition to being rotated as if it were being moved by an outside force, or simply reverting to a sort of weightless state.

At the same time, Lloyd and Tammaeroth looked at each other while they held on to the top edge.

“We can’t let her fall with them,” Lloyd yelled to her.

For a split second, there was true hesitation marked in Tammaeroth’s features. But when she looked down at Nurana, broken and hopeless, the Dremora shook her head at her own thoughts. “We won’t let her fall with them,” she said. She adjusted her grip and flipped around with her back to the bridge. “Slide her and hold on to my ankle!”

Her instructions weren’t intuitive, but they made sense when Lloyd reached her and saw what she meant. He held on to the swaying bridge with one hand and Tammaeroth’s ankle with the other, too panicked to even feel as afraid as he should have. The rest of the bodies tumbled from the bridge, flailing helplessly into the darkness like ants in the wind. Neither of them even knew what the hell they planned to do next, but they didn’t spare a moment to even think about that; with Lloyd gripping her ankle, Tammaeroth grabbed Nurana’s wrists while dangling upside down, pulling her off of the bridge and letting her dangle in the air too. The enemy Seducer’s hand slipped, letting her fall into the Void as well and leaving only the trio.

Tearing every muscle in his arms, Lloyd strained until he went cross-eyed, pulling Tammaeroth up just high enough for her to hook her knee over one of the parapets which was once on the side of the bridge but now on the top due to the rotation. After a few terrifying seconds of adjusting his position, Lloyd was able to grab her by the belt and pull her waist over the top of the bridge, giving her enough leverage to balance on her own. Together, they pulled Nurana, now a trembling mess of a person, in between them as they sat on top of the bridge. Tammaeroth’s fingers all cramped, preventing her from even opening her fists.

The three of them gasped for air as they all sat, alone and accompanied only by the groaning of the bridge. There was a slight shimmering sound forming the background ambience of Oblivion, like a distorted hum resembling an alien form of communication, but other than that, all was quiet. Lloyd and Tammaeroth held Nurana tightly in between them, looking at each other wearily.

“We did great,” Lloyd said without a hint of sarcasm. “All things considered…we got really, really close.”

More tired than sad, Tammaeroth just looked into his eyes as the bridge swayed. “We did.” She wasn’t particularly expressive or emotional as a person, but they raw look she gave him - like a person so stripped down and involuntarily exposed that they didn’t even bother clothing their nakedness anymore - said much more than her words. “I’m grateful for every moment we had - every last one.”

Waiting to die, they both held clasped hands and held Nurana in between them, not needing words anymore. They both wished the Seducer could have had an easier time accepting the end, but at least she wasn’t alone. They all had that.

The bridge shook again, but they didn’t jump or overtly react this time. No longer fighting the inevitable, they let the last pieces on the ends of the structure crumble away, falling as they would in a few moments. When the last bit of the asteroid cracked, they lost the ground they’d been sitting on, and the threesome tumbled into the waters of Oblivion.


	94. Swimming in the Astral Ocean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The bridge collapses, for sure, but they have yet to realize why.

Freefalling into the starry blackness of space, the trio never let go of one another. Even Nurana, who wouldn’t open her eyes, dug her nails into Lloyd and Tammaeroth’s arms as they hugged on to her, tumbling into the Void as one. There was no time for soliloquies or musings on the futility of life; from the time they’d pulled themselves up on the bridge to the moment when they were falling toward the wide open nothingness couldn’t have been more than one minute. All they had was each other, and the reassurance that they’d tried their best.

From the swirling Void, another distortion shimmered at them, twisting and molding as it broke out from the heated gasses. A pillar moved upward against them, slamming into them hard enough to knock the wind out of all of them. Short swords curled out of the pillar, wrapping around their limbs with curious precision, causing no harm other than ruining the surface of their armor. Those blades intertwined with their arms, and they all held on to each other more tightly as their legs dangled below them.

Up and up, the pillar moved, brining them back to the top of the column which had been supporting the bridge. The swirling shape drew near until its features became distinct in the starlight. The blades were not swords, but talons on the end of long fingers; the pillar grabbing them was not more rock, but scales; and the shape drawing near wasn’t swirling, but slimy. A pair of fish eyes inspected them, and they all looked up when they realized that they weren’t falling anymore.

Tammaeroth was the first to recognize what had happened. “Namazu!” she cried joyfully while letting go of her two companions and leaping onto the shape.

“No, wait!” Lloyd yelled on instinct, though he had nothing to fear.

Tammaeroth landed on the shoulders of an ichthyoid giant the size of a small barn. Climbing onto its back, she wrapped her arms around its scales and folds like a child crawling on her grandfather. The Lurker remained passive, showing no predatory instincts toward the edible humanoid clinging to its back. Those two fish eyes stared at the Breton and Seducer with the unaggressive innocence of a curious child watching a doormouse.

The Dremora waved them over. “Help her onto its other shoulder!” Tammaeroth yelled to Lloyd. “If Namazu got here, it can get us out!”

Suddenly more aware of the fact that he’d almost died, Lloyd felt a slight tremble of his own as he braced the traumatized Seducer against him. “I have no idea what’s going on,” he murmured while the Lurker pulled them close. Lloyd slid onto the monster’s shoulder when its fingers uncurled, carrying Nurana with him until he could put her between himself and the Lurker’s neck. “What happens now?” he asked.

“Namazu must have been the one lifting the bridge,” Tammaeroth said while patting the Lurker’s giant head. “It’s imprecise, but smarter than it looks.” She scratched the Lurker behind its fin-ear. “Go go go!” she said in her language.

Climbing to the top of the broken pillar, the giant from the benthic zone perched for only a second before measuring the next broken pillar along the way. In a single terrifying moment, it hopped to the next pillar like a frog. The sense of helplessness and lack of control weren’t mediated by the monster’s friendliness, and Lloyd started to cling to Namazu like Nurana was. Tammaeroth seemed to trust the fishy giant totally, though, and let out a war cry when the second pillar started to crumble and collapse under Namazu’s immense weight.

One after one, the asteroid pillars crashed into the waters of Oblivion upon impact by the Lurker. Never missing a beat, Namazu continued hopping without strain, leading them to the part of the bridge which hasn’t been broken off. The asteroid structure began to crack again under its weight, and the Lurker galloped much like Nirn’s giants, one foot ahead of the other, covering ground at the same speed as a horse as the bridge fell off in pieces like dominoes behind it. Another shimmering skein opened up in front of them, and Namazu ferried them into the bright green light.

Disorientation took over as they left the Void through another portal, once again switching from falling to propelling forward. Warm, humid air pricked their skin as Namazu emerged on the other side, landing on a bridge which properly secured its weight.

Dazed and confused, the trio didn’t resist when the icthyoid titan pulled them from its back and set them on the ground. All three of them fell down, much to the Lurker’s amusement, and it left them alone to collect themselves while it waited.

Lloyd rose to his knees, feeling the ground and then pinching himself to be sure it was real. He grabbed both of his companions to be sure they were breathing, but when he looked up, he was more awestruck than he’d been when he’d first entered the black space between planes.

“Apocrypha…” he gasped.

All around him, the green clouds swirled around the world he’d read and reread about countless times. The ebony spires rising out of the ocean of writing ink, stone walls of submerged castles breaching the surface, stacks of books twirling in physically impossible arrangements, tentacles writhing everywhere…a sight which would have chilled most other mortals to the bone felt like the most serene, welcoming place Lloyd could have dreamed of.

Starry eyed and relieved, Tammaeroth appeared less militant, if not innocent, as her face shined with hope. “We did it…by the Golden Eye, we really did it…” she gasped, just as awestruck.

All three of them rose to their feet and took in the arcane environment. The muggy atmosphere completely devoid of wind felt steamy like a sauna yet didn’t cause them to sweat.

“May I finally have a home!” Tammaeroth sighed in a quiet prayer. Lloyd pinched her arm affectionately, and she turned to face him.

“Your mission has been accomplished…we did do it, Tammy.” The two of them breathed easily and watched the scenery for a moment. Their bliss was interrupted when Lloyd realized that he couldn’t find the third part of their arrangement. “Nurana?” he asked loudly and worriedly.

The two of them turned to find Nurana on the other side of the bridge, kneeling as she stared over the horizon with her back to them. Her shoulders were still trembling, and Lloyd remembered how deeply affected she’d been by the rejection of her fellow Mazken.

The original duo joined her, kneeling on either side of her as she removed her helmet and tossed it aside carelessly. She wouldn’t face them at first, staring at her knees and slumping.

“You should have let me fall,” she whispered, depressed.

“Come on, that’s nonsense,” Lloyd said. “For better or for worse, we were in this together.”

She shook her head. “You almost died because of me, and your death means our deaths. I’m the reason they found us.”

Tammaeroth tried to turn Nurana’s chin to look at her, though the Seducer refused. “Stop it. We lived. That’s all that matters.”

Nurana began to sniffle immaturely. “You could have let me drop into Oblivion. I’d reform in Coldharbour, and you wouldn’t need me around. I only slowed you down.”

“Nurana, we both agree that losing you isn’t an option; you’re imagining a problem that doesn’t exist,” Lloyd assured her.

“That’s right,” Tammaeroth added.

“W-why…after all these centuries together, serving Azura and then Molag Bal…why did they turn on me?” Nurana was clearly referring to the other Seducers, traumatized like a person who’d never been betrayed or cheated on before. “Why was it so easy for them?”

“Because they’re fickle and unloyal,” Tammaeroth said while hugging her.

“Then, then, how can you both care to save me when I tried to kill you both?” Nurana stammered, and then she started to cry. Lloyd hugged her too even though the sound of an adult sobbing was a little awkward. Namazu squatted down to watch curiously, though only the empathetic humanoids could comprehend what was happening. “I did horrible things to you both, why did you almost get killed to pull me back on the bridge?”

Nurana clung to them so hard that it hurt, closing her eyes as she wailed and leaning in to them like they were pulling her up all over again. In a way, they were, as she hadn’t truly tasted the bitterness of treason the way they had. Disturbed by events which she couldn’t rationalize, the Seducer balled her eyes out, pulling them harder to her like she just wanted to be held.

Moving Nurana’s arms around, Tammaeroth rotated the crying daedra so she could face them. In yet another surprise from the typically introverted Dremora, Tammaeroth wiped Nurana’s tears away and tilted her chin up, proving unexpectedly competent at pep talks.

“Listen to me…a long time ago, I did a terrible thing. I betrayed my own clan…the only allies I’d known, in a horrendous way which led to their permanent deaths in Aetherius. I did the most awful thing one of our kind could do, and I suffered dearly and deservedly for it. I no longer grieve, but I feel the loss every single day without end. I know betrayal, Nurana, but in a much worse way than you. And I know, from experience, that people can change. Whatever you did to us or others, you can make up for it…because you’re not a traitor, and you’re not irredeemable. Your certainly more redeemable than I was.”

Lloyd listened intently, shocked beyond belief to learn that Nurana had told the truth about Tammaeroth having been the one who betrayed her own clan. He thought no less of her because of her past, but he fully understood her words - as well as much of her behavior - once he’d heard it directly from her mouth.

Not wanting to ruin the beautiful moment Tammaeroth had crafted, Lloyd just cupped the back of Nurana’s head and nodded to what the repentant traitor was sharing. A few more choked sobs escaped Nurana’s throat as she wrapped her arms around them in a group hug. Shaking less and less, Nurana’s breathing evened out, and even if she was still shaken, she didn’t seem traumatized anymore.

She was still Nurana, of course, so she still had to make everybody else squirm even without intending to.

“I love you both.”

Lloyd and Tammaeroth both paused and stiffened up, awkward as hell and unsure of how to react. Nurana’s voice had been so tender, so sincere, that she didn’t seem to mean it as a joke. When she pulled her head back, the look she gave them caused them both to internally panicked. Nurana actually expected a response.

“Uh…um…we…love…you…too?” Lloyd asked rather than said. He glanced at Tammaeroth, but she was as taken aback and uncomfortable as he was.

“Yes…sure…one love,” the embarrassed Dremora said as well.

Thankfully, Namazu’s fish brain had interpreted the group hug as a sort of competition, saving them from any further questioning. The scaly giant wrapped its arms around them in a wet hug, lifting them up and humming a strange fish sound. The Lurker carried them away, walking down the bridge and toward a tower in the distance leading up to an incredible presence in the sky whose gaze could be felt from a mile away.


	95. The Awe of an Interdimensional Omniscient

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mortal comes face to eye/tentacle/ectoplasm with an omniscient being capable of traversing the fourth dimension. More questions are raised than answers.

The feeling of being watched increased in intensity as Namazu carried them closer and closer to the open-air tower lined by stone walls. That feeling of being watched would normally have felt intrusive and unwelcome, but in Apocrypha, surrounded by the black buildings, green sky, and beige tile floor, Lloyd felt oddly safe and secure. Not even the heretical, non-Euclidean architecture or the physics-defying stacks of books made him uneasy. As Namazu carried them further down a great, ebony-lined hallway, Watchers peeked out of glassless windows, slinking around to peer at the newcomers. Thick, disembodied tentacles rose out of random pools of ink, imposing in countenance yet bowing deferentially as the newcomers passed. Even another Lurker poked its head out of an ink pool, eyeing them hungrily but then bowing its head respectfully when Namazu gurgled a droning comment that resembled, however vaguely, the Ehlnofex dialect used by Dremora.

By the time their possessive Lurker had brought them up the beige steps leading to the tower platform, the sense of awe had waned but been replaced with the omnipresence of the entity waiting in the sky. Even the impossibly long tentacles and detached eyes hanging out of the inky ocean and the shimmering skies blended naturally into the scenery and were hardly noticeable when compared to the incorporeal gaze fixated on every last detail. As alien as Apocrypha was to Nirn, the Breton felt as comfortable as the Dremora next to him. The Seducer was still adjusting.

One by one, Namazu set them down like dolls, placing them in a row standing next to each other as carefully as a toddler would handle its favorite toys. The three of them were facing the edge of the platform, watching the glistening, translucent black ocean roil all across the horizon. When the voice spoke, however, focusing on anything else became difficult. The sound wasn’t telepathic, but rather audial, and it reached them from all directions.

“My loyal pet has returned from its foray.”

The voice echoed and expanded across the entire horizon yet the high volume was neither painful to listen to nor oppressive in its breadth. Its cadence felt like a massage to the motor strip of one’s brain, similar to certain drugs but without the loss of common sense or self control. The speech was slow, slow and patient like a speaker who’d lived a thousand lifetimes, and it perpetually sounded like it were suppressing a yawn.

Then Namazu spontaneously began to gag. Dry heaving in an awful fashion, the ichthyoid terror of the deep bent down and retched, coughing up a lump of flesh, metal, and torn fabric. Moving and groaning in pain, the figure raised an appendage which seemed to be a head, though the skin was deteriorated by Namazu’s bile. When the raspy voice coughed up spittle and hacked, the identity became clear.

“I submit to your will!” Mr. Doom pleaded through his deformed mouth.

Two Seekers whom Lloyd didn’t recognize appeared, levitating Mr. Doom’s body until the breathing apparatus broke off. The ashy Dremora manbaby struggled in vain as he was floated away by the two octo-demonds. The speaker ignored Mr. Doom’s plea entirely.

“Remove his concept organ and implant it into the reflection urns; a millennium spent in thought will provide ample time for this wretch to reconsider its past sins.”

“Noooooo!” Mr. Doom cried as the Seekers took him away and prepared all but his brain for disposal. Nurana shivered at the sight, of which the omnipresent speaker took notice, and the world was filled with its voice chiming in every place equally without diminishing.

“Fear not, penitent prowler, for your fate is no longer the plaything of the Schemer. In fact, the one more deserving of that has been right next to you all along.”

Of the many portals open in the sky with lazy tentacles dangling, one of them had featured a particularly long appendage which had been reaching down from the moment the group had arrived. Welcoming and unaggressive, the dry tentacle reached down without the subtlety of a predator, instead making no secret of its target. Firmly wrapping around Lloyd’s waist, the enormous octo-arm held him even more gently than Namazu had. Despite his awe and calmness upon entering the fabled realm of the Scryer, a mild sense of dread filled him when he realized that he was being lifted off of the ground.

“This is a little high up,” Lloyd chuckled nervously as the tentacle pulled him above the tower as well as the surrounding walls.

He looked up and immediately regretted the action. The portal from which the tentacle had emerged was so high in the sky that any amount of wind would have sent him flying far, far away from the only location he knew of in that plane of existence. The length of the tentacle continued receding into the portal, though, as if its only purpose was to move objects onto Apocrypha’s surface or to fling them into the waters of Oblivion.

“Oh…we need to go higher than this?” he asked, openly afraid of the elevation.

Down below him, he could see his companions shrinking to the size of ants. The tentacle’s speed was slow like the appendage had not a care in the world. That slow speed and Apocrypha’s complete lack of wind made the ordeal safe in the technical sense, but the Breton’s heart rate continued to rise along with the distance between him and the plane’s surface.

“It’s quite alright, I can see you now! There’s no need to go any further up, right?”

Higher and higher, the tentacle pulled him until he mingled among the other tendrils hanging out of the portal. The tower’s outline was clear in the green swirls of shimmering energy in between them, but he could no longer tell if anybody was still waiting for him there or not. At a few miles up, the tentacle had entered him into Apocrypha’s stratosphere.

Clinging to the tentacle for dear life, he didn’t even notice the mass of eyes materializing in front of him without the need for portals. They all watched him like the omnipresence had been, but the existence of the eyes gave him a physical anchor which his mortal psyche could focus on.

“Welcome to my realm, Lloyd Rolsen of Glenumbra. You are safer here than in any other place, for you are the guest of the Demon of Knowledge. Open your eyes.”

Loosening his grip on the tentacle, Lloyd let himself lay in the Scryer’s grasp, still nervous but trusting the omniscient being. The eyes were wide and alert, and he struggled to comprehend the notion of a daedric prince addressing him personally.

“Thank you for your kindness, Lord Mora,” he said, working out the residual nervousness from their elevation. He could almost see the starry blackness of Oblivion further above the portal.

“Your devotion to unveiling knowledge is the thanks which earned your welcome…my servant.”

The last words echoed around him, and as afraid as he was of exiting a plane’s troposphere, Lloyd retained the wherewithal to realize the gravity of Hermaeus Mora’s words.

“I’m truly honored to serve, Lord Mora. I don’t have the words,” he replied.

“You will have them soon, for I, the Master of the Tides of Fate, have decreed it. The yarn of your life will be long - longer than you’d expected. It weaves in a peculiar path across the tapestry of the past and future, spun from a thread I selected myself. You will have many more words, Lloyd Rolsen, in your efforts to fight ignorance in Mundus. By serving the people of your world, you also serve me.”

Joyful beyond what he could have expected, his fear of their great elevation faded. “Am I your champion now?” Lloyd asked without thinking. He would have expected the answer had he considered the matter.

“Of course not. I already have a champion, and he has supported my cause for a period commendable even among immortals. No, you are still my servant, for you must begin filling more volumes now that you’re debt has been paid.”

“W-what debt?” he asked.

“Why, the debt for the gifts you’ve gained through the pursuit of knowledge. Two daedric thralls who would lay down their lives for you, multiple minions who would perform your toil for you, the knowledge of transportation between Nirn and Apocrypha…you’ve been well supported, Lloyd Rolsen, and you will continue to be well supported as long as you contribute to the stacks in your tower here.”

Normally, being hopelessly confused would have embarrassed him, but when faced with the Demon of Knowledge, admitting ignorance felt natural. “I’m sorry, Lord Mora, I…I don’t know what you mean. Which tower, what stacks to you refer to?” he asked, practically tickling Hermaeus Mora with his questioning.

“Why, my loyal servant, do you not remember the Tower of Paradox in Apocrypha’s southwestern octosphere? I expect great things from my emissary to Nirn, for it is through you that I can interact with your people while adhering to my agreement with the Clockwork God.”

Lloyd blinked, searching through his usually razor-sharp memory. The terms were familiar, just on the tip of his tongue, but he felt the frustration of a person who’d forgotten what they’d wanted to say in the middle of their own sentence. The floating eyes waited, observing his attempts to recall what he’d wanted to tell them.

“Wait, Lord Mora…the southwestern…eight hemispheres…or, octospheres…I remember…no, wait,” Lloyd said, straining to think of every last detail which had transpired on Summerset. “Yes, the Coldharbour Compact! It wasn’t violated during my mission because you didn’t intervene, it was…it was…” The eyes watched him struggle yet provided little help.

“You completed your mission through the aid of your effort, as well as your gifts.”

“Yes, but…there was something else…someone,” Lloyd said, gaining little help from the coy voice of the Scryer. “One of your minions helped us! It gave Tammaeroth the mission, and it spoke to me…bound Nurana to me…”

“Oh? How curious, my servant. For I am the preserver of memory, the treasurer of knowledge, yet this comes as a surprise. Far be it from me to violate the agreement I made with Sotha Sil.”

“Yes, that’s what it said! The thing, that…entity which helped me! Oh, why can’t I remember…Salty? Server? Say-the-Truth…or was it Stay-Late-at-Night? Please, Lord Mora, if anybody knows what I’m talking about, it’s you!” Lloyd pleaded. “It was the perfect predecessor…or the primeval predelict…no, the primeval premonition of the southwestern hemisphere! Or…demisphere…it helped me, saved me a few times, and opened that pocket realm near Shimmerene!”

“There there, my loyal servant; do not fret for the illusions of false memories. My domain is that of certainty and truth, as is yours, now and forever. You used your gift to open that skein into Oblivion, and you’ve proved to be a fast, capable learner. I have no doubt that you’ll fill the new shelves of your tower soon enough. For now, I grant you the right to wander the endless stacks of my library for a time. Before you return to the arena to continue your efforts, I have a small matter to address with your thralls.”

For much of the conversation, the tentacle had been lowering Lloyd back down to the platform, though he hadn’t noticed until just then. Confused by his forgetting but too shy to contradict his benefactor, he didn't press the matter further even while he grappled with the empty space in his memory. The descent from the plane's upper atmosphere to the surface caused him enough anxiety such that he found even the details he'd been able to tell the Scryer to begin slipping from his mental grasp, and his focus teetered and tottered until the interplanar cephaliarch had returned him to the welcoming tower's platform. Even the amount of time the skyscraping tentacle needed to return him to the ground seemed truncated and artificially reduced, adding doubt to the Breton's recollection of what he'd said.

Back down on the platform, he found his two daedric companions - or three since the fish-giant had chosen to hang around - waiting for him intently. Though Nurana seemed uneasy and uncharacteristically subdued, her counterpart had a similar expression on her face, more akin to a fallen angel than a demon, as she gazed up at the tentacle portal in the sky. Without even summoning eyes to focus on, Hermaeus Mora spoke, filling the entire platform with an expansive voice which didn't extend beyond the immediate area.

"You, Tammaeroth Who Lost, outcast from Clan Dagon, are welcomed to your new home."

In a flash, Tammaeroth prostrated on the ground, facing off the edge of the platform in a direction only she and Namazu seemed to understand. Even her movement seemed stiff and systematic like a ritualized deference which a member of a military caste would understand. She didn't speak, waiting for instructions from the Prince of Fate.

"The end of your mission is itself the swearing of your oath. Rejoice, and retire until further directed."

Tammaeroth rose with her head bowed and walked backwards until she reached the beginning of the staircase, then stopped. "Yes, Lord Mora," she said while keeping her eyes fixated on the ground.

As if knowing her turn was next, Nurana folded her arms defensively, trying specifically not to face in the direction which the other daedra were. There was no hiding from the Golden Eye, and the lack of resolve in Nurana's expression implied that she was aware of that anyway.

"You, Nurana Who Won, shifter of loyalties, are granted your choice."

"I accept your terms!" she replied readily and without resistance, once again showing her adaptability in the face of the inevitable - or in this case, the Inevitable Knower.

“Intrepid one, your choice was already known, as foregone as any conclusion drawn by the Prince of Fate; the only question about the matter existed in your own lesser mind. Bask in my presence, and know that I have granted you a gift. The Mazken aren’t know for their loyalty, and this is a fatal folly, for treason is punished severely in my realm when it is foreseen. Know that those who disobey will be mined from the casks of their flesh and stored as your former ally is now.”

Nurana began shaking again, all of her usual boastfulness hidden in the face of a prince of Oblivion. “I’m known for keeping my word - an anomaly among my kind!” she protested, though her unease proved to be little more than entertainment for the omnipotent cephalopod.

“Fear not, for your destiny is recorded in the tomes of my realm. Understand the honor you’re receiving in the retention of your current bodily form: Dark Seducers have sworn their oaths to me in the past, but all of them were extracted from their husks and reformed as Watchers in the Creatia of my realm's oceans to assure their loyalty. Your destiny, however, mandates your current form if you're to assist my new Seeker Aspirant. All you need is to offer me your memories of the other daedric princes you've served, even those you've forgotten, to seal your oath."

Relief temporarily marked the stressed Seducer's face. "It's all for you, Lord Mora! Everything I know!"

"Yes, everything you know, and everything you knew. My pet will show you to the reforming pools where you may offer even what you've forgotten."

"You honor me, my lord, and…wait, what's a reforming pool?" she asked, though Namazu had already reached down and grabbed her hand. "Wait, Lord Mora, can I at least know what's going to happen? Why is it called a 'reforming' pool? What is going to be reformed?"

"Return her to the Tower of Paradox when her memories have been extracted, my pet."

Gurgling like a river beast, Namazu lurched down the steps toward one of the welcoming castle's many halls, dragging Nurana behind it like a child throwing a temper tantrum. "How are they going to be extracted!" Nurana shrieked, though Namazu's long strides soon caused the two daedra to disappear.

"When I did it, it didn’t hurt…that much," Tammaeroth said just before Nurana disappeared, though there was a rare smirk on her face. She remained facing in the same direction, though, and Lloyd stood next to her and stayed quiet until a single eye opened in the air in front of them.

"Your other thrall will only be needed for a brief period, my newest servant. Until then, enjoy the tower which I have given to you. Your first thrall will show you the way, and I will find you when I require your efforts on Nirn again."

"Yes, Lord Mora," Lloyd said, trying to bow his head like Tammaeroth was. "I await your call."

There were no further instructions, the eye simply disappearing. He could still feel the gaze upon him, like a latent sense of security in the back of his mind, but he had so much on his mind that he felt anxious to get Tammaeroth away even before seeing the fabled realm he'd often dreamed of. He nodded to her and they walked down the staircase, hurrying in a direction which she pointed out to him.

"We need to talk," they both said at the same time.


	96. An Expression of Things Left Unsaid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adult content warning.

Tammaeroth led them in the opposite direction from which Namazu and Nurana had gone, into a winding tunnel formed by ebony grating letting in scant amounts of green light. Lloyd's head was spinning from information overload.

"Is it alright if I go first?" he asked as she led him down the seemingly endless tunnel.

In a sign that they really were alone, she bumped into him as they walked and ran her fingers along his wrist. The display of affection caught him off guard so much that he thought it was an accident and moved away, forcing her to reach out and grab his hand. He looked over at her to find a coy smile on her face, but she trained her eyes forward. "Go ahead; I'm sure you have more questions than me."

He smiled too and looked ahead like her. "Thanks," he replied, and squeezed her hand. She squeezed back and worked harder to suppress her smile, and he mused at how he felt like a child again. "Listen, when I spoke to Hermaeus Mora, I wanted to tell him something, but I forgot in the middle of telling him. He then told me that the memory was false."

"Memory is the domain of Lord Mora; if he said it's false, than it is."

"But I remember what happened, Tammy; I need to know if you do, too. I remember, but I'm forgetting. Listen to this part, because it's very important: how did you find me on Summerset?"

At first, she thought nothing of it. "My mission was to get to Alinor and prevent your arrest. I knew that before I even left Apocrypha."

"Yes, but how did you get the mission? Another Dremora, Herald Kixathi, got you safe passage here, but she wasn't the one who gave you the mission, right?"

"Of course not; she never even left Nirn," Tammaeroth replied matter-of-factly.

"And then you spent what felt like four months here, but it was forty years on Nirn. You had no oath at that time."

She ran her thumb over his. "Lloyd, you're stressed, and this is a lot to take in even for a daedra, much less a mortal. It's okay to feel overwhelmed."

"Just a minute, I'm getting to the crux of the issue: how did you get the mission to save me?"

"I got it here, in…" Her voice trailed off for a few moments as she lost her train of thought. When her pace slowed, he knew that she was beginning to understand his point. "I was given the mission here, but not from Lord Mora…I wasn't allowed to meet him…"

"Right, just like you told me at the House of Reveries. You couldn't meet Lord Mora directly…you met something else, right?"

Hesitant and doubting her own mind, she pursed her lips tightly, but smiled while doing so, nearly laughing at their situation. "I don't know…it wasn't Lord Mora…it was…well, I never talked much to the other minions here. Just that merchant sometimes because he sold nice things. And Namazu, but Namazu can't really talk back."

"So there's a gap in your memory, just like mine. Tammy…how did I bring you back in that Thalmor prison?"

"You pulled my soul back to my body."

"But it wasn't me! Tammy, why can't I cast healing magic anymore?"

"Healing? Since when could you…" She paused, finally looking at him, giving him an almost comedic look that he'd never seen from her. Her jet black hair, now with dark green streaks in it, fell over her face, and he almost lost track of his thoughts again while marveling at how laid back and content she'd become now that she had a home. "Wait, you healed me," she said incredulously, bringing him back into the present. "Under Alinor, when Nurana was still our enemy. You weren't very good at it, but you did."

"You're right, but now I can't. I don't remember any restoration magic at all. And I certainly couldn't have revived you in that prison. How did you come back?" he asked, but she pursed her lips and furrowed her brow in a manner he found rather cute. "Who opened that skein through Oblivion, the one which collapsed once we traversed it?"

She started to laugh, one of the few times he'd heard the sound, and he wished she'd continue. "This is weird, Lloyd. Very weird. I remember my mission, how much pressure I felt…and I remember that I wasn't lone when I left Apocrypha and entered Summerset. I'm sure of that."

"This is the same subject I tried to discuss with Lord Mora, but I blanked out. There's something going on. A dragon break? A localized one focused only on us?"

"No, dragon breaks are serious matters. This is…I don't know what it is," she chortled, amused by their situation. "I feel like I told you about my mission in Rellenthil. As in, I told you everything there was to know. We should both know."

"Your fire magic…how did you get it back?" he asked, causing her to laugh again. He didn't know if there was even a point in discussing the details anymore, or if he just enjoyed the sound of her sincere laughter. "And why is my fire magic gone? In the Thalmor prison, when we broke out, who were all of the other daedra running from?"

"They were running from you, Lloyd."

"What?!" he exclaimed, though she gave him a weird look.

"I don't see what that has to do with anything. You were impressive there, by the way; even that Xivilai panicked and ran away from you."

"I don’t remember that at all. The other daedra were running before we even left the jail cell. It wasn't me, that was the point I was trying to make."

The two of them reached the end of the tunnel, finding a single engraved plaque on a podium at the end. Without giving him advanced warning, Tammaeroth pulled Lloyd close to her and activated the plague by tracing her fingers over the daedric verses. The otherworldly device chimed in reaction, teleporting them to a small room in a small yet ornate room resembling a closet with intricate etching characteristic of the realm. Unprepared for the instant bodily transport, Lloyd stumbled forward, and she hugged him so he wouldn't fall on her.

The almost tribal-like body markings all over her face and arms - now dark green rather than red - started to fluctuate and change in shade as she blushed. "Hey," she said while looking up at him.

He waited to see if anything else unexpected would happen after they'd teleported, but all he felt was the new sensation of her pressed against his chest. "Hey," he replied as he held her. "I wasn't ready for that."

In another curious change in behavior, she answered without being serious. "I'm full of surprises," she chortled, unable to complete the sentence without laughing. "Come on, I didn't tell you what I'd wanted to say yet." She pulled away from him almost reluctantly and held his hand again, leading him into another ebony hallway full of similar such closets with more plaques.

"I'm sorry, I stole the conversation for a while there; what did you need to tell me?"

"A few things, really," she replied while leading him down the hall. She brushed her silky locks away from her face and looked down, shy like when he'd first met her again. "You know that I wasn't happy for a longer time than you'd ever lived, when we first met. You've helped me to change that part of my life forever. And maybe you know that in a latent sense, but I feel like saying it out loud: you saved me, Lloyd. You never tried to escape me, you never treated me like a monster, you even came back for me." She stopped herself as she tended to do when she was emotional, though this time it was joy which she was working to contain. "Understand how seriously a kyn will take that. No matter what happens, now and forever, we're like this," she said, squeezing his hand again to make her point.

His heart fluttered as if he were a boy holding a girl's hand for the first time, and he let out a little laugh too, at himself. "For better or for worse, in sickness and in health, as we say. I had no regrets when we thought we'd die, and I have no regrets now."

She'd bitten her lower lip while he answered, distracting him from where they were even going. The architecture of Apocrypha was alien and unfamiliar to him, and he had difficulty telling where they were. She led him into another hallway, though, this one mostly empty save a few surprisingly well-organized stacks of books.

“I feel like this is your handiwork,” he said while nodding toward the neat stacks lining the walls at convenient intervals.

“I was given this little hall for the time I was here. I needed to feel at home.” She led him further down the hall, to a door in between two stacks.

“This is the first proper door I’ve seen in this plane,” he said while she opened it. She let the door open only a crack, though, and looked over her shoulder at him. “Everything else is closed off with gates and gratings.”

“I ordered this from that merchant, whatever his name was. I’d brought some coin with me from Nirn, when I’d been at the mage’s tower, and I furnished what I could inside.” Still holding his hand, she turned around to face him and ran the fingers of her free hand through her hair slowly, pulling only some of the strands away from her face. “I needed something of my own, even if my status here was unclear. Nobody else has ever been in here, and I obviously didn’t expect guests. Please keep that in mind.”

The way she was standing so loosely, devoid of her usual military posture, was making him lose focus on their conversation almost as much as the sudden realization of how far away the rest of the world seemed in that low, narrow hallway. "I'd never judge," he replied, finding that the tips of his fingers tingled. When she lingered at the door a few seconds, as if to make him wait, he felt the urge to take her other hand in his; just before he made contact, though, she leaned against the door, moving backwards and pulling him inside.

He followed her into the sparsely furnished bedroom, stopping at the two stacked mattresses without a bed because there were only a few feet of space between that and the door. Aside from a single poorly enchanted lantern hanging in one corner, the only source of illumination was the grating leading out to a balcony, allowing in green light slightly dimmed by a cheap curtain she'd nailed to the wall and held to the floor with books as weights. Before he could inspect the neatly made bedsheets or the half-empty weapon rack against the wall, though, the sound of the door closing pulled his attention back behind him.

Leaning against the door languidly, she'd been watching him wordlessly, letting one arm rest behind her head. She was giving him the same coy gaze, eyelids hooded, as a rather welcome form of tension simmered between them. "I believe we had unfinished business," she chortled, again unable to drop lines without laughing, "before our dance was interrupted." He didn't need much time to remember their last night in Rellenthil when they'd tried to run away together.

Until then, her other arm had been hidden behind her back. When the turned a latch to lock the door, causing an audible brass clicking noise, a spark flew between them that burned more brightly than anything either of them could remember.

He closed the distance separating them, pressing himself into her as she grinned like a fool and shut her eyes. Her body squirmed against the door as he took her in his arms, reveling in the sensation of his hands passing over her back. The long, deep breath she exhaled drove him crazy, compelling him to lean down closer to her. The bridge of his nose rubbed against hers as he paused and just felt her short, increasingly rapid breaths against his lips. As if she'd been struggling to show restraint and had suddenly faltered, she fisted a hand in his hair and pulled his head forward. Their lips met for the second time, reminding them of the first night they'd been unable to control themselves, and he relished the taste of her kiss once more. They both melted fast twisting and turning as their hands explored each other. He caught her off guard when he caught ahold of her tongue, and she moaned into his mouth so desperately that her sound turned into a whimper, like a woman dying of thirst crawling into an oasis.

He released her, leaving her gasping until she made the mistake of turning her head away from the intensity. The soft skin of her neck was exposed, and he preyed on her like a gentle vampire, nibbling on the bare skin of her neck. Her breath hitched in her throat, and she dug her nails into his clothes to hold herself up, her toes tapping and sliding across the floor while he made her forget which way was up. When he found his way lower down on her throat, her voice returned to her, and she squealed in vain as she tried to regain her balance. Having had the first taste, he stole another kiss before granting her a moment to breathe while he unlatched the elven armor she'd been wearing since they arrived. She didn't need prompting to do the same, and the two of them laughed and fumbled with the glass armor for a few moments.

"Don't think I've given up!" she laughed while removing his armor's faulds and drawing her thumbs along the inner part of his thigh.

Not to be outdone, he unhooked her culet from her breastplate, running his fingers and then his entire hands down her butt, nearly causing her pretty yellow eyes to pop out of her head. He pressed his lips right against her ear, making her squeal again. "Don't start something you can't finish," he whispered before taking her earlobe between his lips.

Defeated by the attack on her ear and the way he squeezed her butt cheeks, she melted in his arms, no longer coherent. She jumped up and wrapped her legs around his waist, signaling her surrender by tilting her head until her neck was exposed and letting him have his way. He collapsed on her mattresses, giving in to lust as well, and fulfilling a dream they'd both been suppressing for too long. They didn't need much time to fling each others' clothes across her bedroom and un-make her carefully folded sheets.


	97. The Big Reveal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adult content warning.

Days passed…maybe even a week. They didn't know. Time flowed in as peculiar fashion as she'd once described, making them easily lose track of how much time they'd spent completely unclothed and on that bed. Every time one of them woke up alone, they'd go back to sleep; every time they woke up together, they found themselves unable to resist one another, fulfilling pent up desires to the point of exhaustion. Only when the two of them were too sore and stiff to pleasure each other any more did they finally relax and simply hold each other and chat.

"I think I might finally be hungry," Lloyd murmured after giving her a soft kiss on the forehead.

Lazily laying her head on his chest, she closed her eyes from comfort rather than sleepiness. "Hmm, yes. Me too. I finally feel it."

"So…is life here always like this? You don't get hungry often, you only sleep when you want to?"

"Well, we might need to sleep eventually even if we don't want to," she replied while hugging around his body. "It's nothing like Mundus, I can tell you that. We haven't even gone to the bathroom since we arrived."

He shared a laugh with her about it, marveling at the nature of the plane. "I almost wish we didn't have to go back."

"Well, you say that now. Most daedra say that too, yet they readily accept the chance to travel to Nirn to serve their princes, even if they could do more in Oblivion."

"They really accept hunger, fatigue, and going to the toilet?" he chuckled, getting her to laugh again.

"Everybody says they hate it, but everybody relishes the chance to prompt change on Nirn."

For a moment, he fell quiet and then opened his eyes. "I plan on telling Lord Mora how much I need you with me. I don't know what I'd do if he assigned you another task here."

Her soft hum allayed his fears. "Oh, that's a non-issue. I'm bound to you now. In all planes of Oblivion, when a daedra is bound to a mortal, they either kill them both as a cleansing, or more often, they put the mortal to work. The binding can't be tampered with, not even by the princes or by aedric influence. Mundus has the advantage over Oblivion in that." She felt his unease and turned her head to look up at him. "There's literally nothing to fear on that point; we just need to keep you alive. That's our task."

The use of the plural pronoun brought back a number of memories he'd not forgotten but had suppressed. Perhaps it was the confessional culture he'd been raised with at the Temple of Akatosh, but he felt the sting of guilt when they discussed that topic: subtle, small as a pinpoint, but relentless.

"I hope I can deserve your loyalty and trust," he murmured, immediately both regretting and feeling relieved by the words.

"Oh? You already have them. What's wrong, though?"

Staring at the ceiling and wondering if his comment would join his list of life's stupidest mistakes, he felt her eyes on him. Empathic and trusting, those yellow eyes laid on the guilt without even trying, and he felt unable to change the subject or dodge the issue. "May I confess something to you, Tammy?" he asked.

Unsuspicious to a degree which stung him even more, she reached for his hand under the covers. "Anything. Anything. I don't like seeing you bothered."

"I…" He paused, wondering not only how he'd say it, but how he'd allowed it to happen in the first place. "I betrayed your trust during the last week we were on Nirn, Tammy. Since then, I've struggled with the feeling that I don't deserve you."

She raised an eyebrow, finally skeptical at that remark. "I highly doubt that, Lloyd. Compared to me, I don't think you really understand what betrayal is."

"But I still feel bad about it. I don't know what to do."

Slowly, she propped herself up on her elbow, looking him over. He tried to keep looking at the ceiling, but even avoiding her gaze felt dishonest. "Why are you bringing this up now? Do you know?"

"Know what?" he asked.

"Do you…you already know, and this is your way of letting me admit it easily. That's what you're doing, right?"

He raised his eyebrow this time. "Tammy, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You're not joking…how are you…Lloyd, what's going on?"

"You tell me what's going on," he said, and they both shared a quiet laugh, as uneasy as they'd grown. "I'm being serious, though; I'm not sure what you're talking about."

"Really?"

"Really."

They gazed into each others' eyes for a moment, and that old familiar pout crept onto her face. "I betrayed your trust, too," she sighed. "I thought you knew and were trying to indirectly let me confess."

"I honestly have no idea what you mean, Tammy. I only mean what I said: I did a bad thing, and I keep thinking about it. If you're thinking of something else, then I don't know what it is."

He reached up to tuck her black locks behind her ear, and they shared a sad smile. "Look…let's both just confess what we're thinking about," she said. "No mysteries, not between us. And then it's over, whatever it was. It's all in the past."

Nervous and even more regretful, the twin fangs of guilt and shame which his family had instilled in him bit down hard. No matter how damaging the truth would be, he couldn't resist the urge to tell it to the people he cared about. "Alright," he sighed, and they both laughed together one more time. Then, at the same time, in almost one voice, they both confessed:

"I slept with Nurana."

Like the delay before an exploding fire rune, there were a few seconds of silence wherein they both stared at each other in confusion, wondering if the other was joking. When they both realized that they'd both done the same thing, however, the scandal was fast and furious.

Rising up even higher, she planted her hands on both of his shoulders, pinning him down on the bed. "When the hell did you sleep with Nurana!" Tammaeroth scolded scornfully.

At first, Lloyd felt the fear of a man who'd never betrayed a woman before, worried about the full extent of the reaction he'd get and unsure of what to even say. Despite Tammaeroth's bared teeth and angry glare, however, his mind focused on her apparent hypocrisy. "Well, I…um…wait a minute, when the hell did you sleep with Nurana?" he asked right back.

Although she continued holding him down, the strength in her reaction abandoned her, leaving her even more embarrassed than he was. "I…no, wait a minute! You…you said it first!"

"It doesn't matter who said it, we both did it…apparently," he sighed, almost disappointed. "What happened?"

She pursed her lips, and he could see the nervousness in her eyes, too. Turning in on herself, she started to become shy in a way he'd thought she wouldn't feel around him anymore. "You first," she asked, almost begged, as her eyes fell away from his.

Though it felt wrong, he realized that his guilt decreased when he realized that she wasn't innocent, either. It shouldn't have mattered either way, but he couldn't help the way his sense of morality had been affected by consorting with not one, but two demonic protectors in such a short period of time. "Look…Nurana and I told you how she was bound to me…somehow, by something, I don't remember exactly. I spent a lot of time imposing my will on her; turning a daedra into a thrall isn't easy when they resist, unlike with me and you. We argued a lot, and she schemed a bit, true to her oath to Molag Bal at the time, and we both won some and lost some. One night, she tried to…to convince me that you'd already died and been lost to Oblivion. There was alcohol involved, which was a problem, because I'd never been a heavy drinker even in Stross M'Kai, and I'd been totally straight edge for the year I spent in Summerset. She pretended to be friendly, and…well, I'm guilty. I can't blame anybody for my own actions, not even her. I just feel like, at the time, she was pressuring me a little. More than a little. I don't know. She threatened to tell you in order to embarrass me, but we argued a few more times and then worked things out, and just acted like it never happened.”

Tammaeroth listened the entire time, displeased but also looking guilty herself. She waited so long after he’d finished talking that he started to seriously worry, but eventually, she spoke before he could ask difficult questions.

“That sounds similar to what happened with me. Very similar.”

“When did it happen?” he asked. “We were sleeping in shifts for most of the trip.”

“Do you remember that night you stayed up working with Rehala?”

“Yes, kind of. I worked until I was drowsy and then fell asleep in the next room. You were both downstairs sleeping, and the butler was on night watch.”

Tammaeroth stopped pushing his shoulders down so roughly and relaxed her grip, though she still stared down at his pillow instead of him out of shyness. “Well…Nurana restricted the butler to the kitchen, and he was too scared to question her. Then she showed up at my bedroom and said she wanted to apologize for our fistfight. I told her to go away, but she said she had snacks, so I let her in…she really did have snacks, but she also had a wineskin she’d stolen from you. She was…totally different. Like a cat winding around my legs begging for food. She was pushy and insistent, but suddenly also attentive, and actually asking how I felt about my future.” Tammaeroth paused and sighed, still looking confused but also resigned. “She got what she wanted, and when we woke up the next morning, she threatened to tell you, but I called her bluff, which made her really mad. I got mad too and told her that I’d persuade you to have her turned into a Watcher once we got here, and she freaked out. That’s why she gave me those strawberries at breakfast, and why we got along for the rest of the trip.”

“Because you threatened her back?” he asked, disappointed in all three of them.

Tammaeroth nodded after some hesitation. “Yes…it’s how she is. I see through her better than she realizes. Her confidence is honest, and her self-esteem isn’t fake, but she also likes to belong. She isn’t a loner, and being threatened with isolation or even just being disrespected hurts her a lot. It isn’t how I’d like to deal with her, but I think we won’t have to act like that now that she’s been put in her place.”

“I don’t like treating anyone like that, even her, but she did try to kill us both. She has a way of making me feel sorry for her, but she was much worse to you. How do you get over it so easily?”

Oddly, Tammaeroth just shrugged. “We’re daedra. That’s how we deal with each other. Plus, as scary as dying is for us, it isn’t permanent, and she was only following orders, as was I. She takes orders from you now, as do I, and you take them from Hermaeus Mora. It’s water under the bridge.”

“Or ink under the bridge, since we’re here,” he said, getting her to smile again. “I’m sorry for what happened.”

Still smiling, she was able to make eye contact with him again. “Me too. Though it was only with Nurana for us both…at least it wasn’t with another person.”

“It would never, and will never, be with another,” he replied, cupping her face and running his thumb over her cheek.

“I swear the same; I’m not a cheater. Not that it wasn’t…” She paused, legitimately confused. “Well, you know what I mean. There are limits, and that’s a clear one.”

“Absolutely,” he replied, feeling her squeeze the hand of his under the sheets. Just as he was about to pull her down to him, his stomach growled.

She took the hand of his cupping her face, kissed his palm, but laid the hand down on his chest. “Speaking of Nurana, she’s probably lost and panicking…for the past few days. Plus,we need to freshen up and eat. Plus, Lord Mora has been generous by intentionally ignoring my private room as long as I’ve been here…”

“We shouldn’t abuse that, then,” Lloyd sighed, causing them both to laugh. “There will be other opportunities soon.”

“I know.” She rose from the bed on the side next to another door, standing completely naked and tempting him to pull her back again. She almost looked ready to jump back in for a second, but common sense won out in the end. “I spent the last of my money on a basic washroom…I’ll go first, if you don’t mind.

“I don’t mind the view,” he replied, causing her to cover her face shyly. He watched her sway her hips and close the washroom door with her bare ass, sighing and wishing he could stay in Apocrypha forever. And he hadn’t even started reading any of the books yet.

She had considerable stacks in her room, mostly military strategy books and all of them lighter reading with illustrations, but he wasn’t in a rush just yet. Wanting to see the realm he could probably claim more connection to than his own, he stood up, put on his boots, underwear, and a stray robe, and walked over toward her cheap curtains. He opened them as well as the black grating behind, walking out onto a small balcony weaving around the side of whatever building they were in. It appeared to be a wide, seaside plaza with a tower which he could barely see from his vantage point. Across the inky waters was another, smaller black plaza, floating in the ocean like an island with only a few weird, obese landfish daedra resembling overweight mudskippers licking algae. The sight was one of the most pleasant he ever remembered seeing, like the canals of a partially flooded city on stilts.

As he leaned on the railing of Tammaeroth’s balcony, he felt a pair of eyes upon him other than hers. Suspicious but not defensive, he turned to see the multiple eyes on a cephalopod face staring at him. Déjà vu settled in as he watched the oddly familiar Seeker float on the balcony, wondering how it had gotten there. Only after a few seconds did the word ‘Saline’ return to his mind.


	98. Saline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is another short chapter; it was also one of the most fun chapters to write.

Lloyd stared stupefied at the cephalopod daedra sharing the balcony with him. Fragments of memories, incomplete puzzles with pieces falling away, danced in his mind as he tried to grasp the name which was on the tip of his tongue. A similar odd, alien him to the one he’d heard in the skein through Oblivion filled his mind, tickling his motor strip in a way which he found unwelcome giving the circumstance.

“Who are you?” Lloyd asked the Seeker, though it didn’t answer. “Same-Low-Night…no, you’re name is…Saltine? No, that’s not right.”

The daedra floated up and down, levitating as it watched him, moving slightly as it remained idle. But it didn’t react to him in any discernible way.

Wary of tricks but aware through his conjuration knowledge that the entity in front of him was real, Lloyd kept his distance. “You were the one…you send Tammaeroth on the mission, didn’t you?” he asked to no answer. “You took my magic in exchange for other things…you’re responsible for everything that happened. It was you…I don’t remember the details, but I remember you. You gave…you didn’t give a mission to Nurana. Or did you?”

The Seeker continued floating in front of him, showing no reaction. It didn’t even seem stubborn or obstinate; it simply had no reaction to display.

“How did you pull this off? Why can’t I remember? Even Tammaeroth is forgetting. Hermaeus Mora, he knows all…but he didn’t know what I was talking about when I tried to tell him about you. Or, what I could remember. Why? How?”

Multiple eyes stared back at him without a hint of curiosity or interest, yet they didn’t look away. The daedra was just there, existing without a purpose.

“What kind of a trick is this? How can you even cause the Demon of Knowledge to forget?”

But the Seeker remained silent, disinterested and removed.

“What was it? Some sort of a localized, personalized dragon break? A curse?”

No answer.

“What was the point, even, if you won’t talk about it now?”

Though not sympathetic, there was a glint in the Seeker’s eyes which implied a mild, minuscule amount of attention being paid. It looked at him deeply, acknowledging his concern, and nodded its head. All at once, its many eyes closed like it were trying to show him something. In that position the Seeker stayed, waiting for him to understand.

“Fine, just show me something,” Lloyd said while taking a deep breath. He closed his eyes too, waiting to see what sort of surprise the invertebrate daedra wanted to show him.

But no such thing came: there was no revelation, no epiphany, no sudden realization. He didn’t feel a thing while his eyes were closed. When he opened them, however, he gasped in shock and fought to regain his bearings.

When he’d closed his eyes, he’d been looking at a daedra of some sort, with the door on his left and the balcony railing on his right. When he opened his eyes, he was looking at an empty balcony, with the door on his right and the railing on his left. He hadn’t moved a muscle, yet he was in a different spot. The same spot where he’d been staring for some reason.

The curtains were pushed aside, and Tammaeroth walked out, partially dressed and with wet hair. “Hey, it’s all yours. Enjoying the view?”

She gave him such a sincere yet casual look, an expression devoid of all the burdens and concerns they’d been carrying for so long…their exchange just felt natural. His worries fell away, at least for that moment, and he just felt thankful that they weren’t running anymore.

“Yes…I guess I was,” he replied, wondering what he’d been thinking about a minute ago.

She nodded back toward the curtain. “Come on; there’s actual water in there, as in, not ink. Why don’t you go get ready, and I’ll see what we might need.”

“Absolutely. And I want to know how you managed to get fresh water here in Apocrypha.”

She smiled and took his arm as they walked back inside, leaving the waves of ink to gently lap in the canal behind them.


	99. A New Purpose in Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hermaeus Mora tasks all three of them with new long term goals in life.

Ascending the Tower of Paradox proved to be difficult, though not due to its construction. There were so many nooks and crannies, tables and desks, all of them crammed into the typically narrow mage’s tower, yet all of them were designed and organized with a wisdom which wasn’t always readily apparent. What struck him among all the shelves, nooks, and crannies, though, was how empty the tower was save the few record books they’d appropriated from the Thalmor. The threadbare workspace stuck out like a sore thumb in Apocrypha’s otherwise overflowing libraries. Lloyd ended up stopping at almost every floor on the way up, never feeling like he was spending enough time inspecting the place.

“I’ve never been here before, I’m sure of that,” he murmured while admiring the lack of dust on the empty shelves, as lonely as they looked.

Tammaeroth took him by the arm and pulled him back to the ebony stairs leading to the top of the tower. “I know,” she sighed. “I remember the place well, but I only remember seeing the people you already know. Nothing else.” The two of them walked up the rest of the rest of the winding staircase leading through the roof. “Let’s go to the top. Lord Mora hasn’t called on us, but he’ll notice once we’re up this high, no matter where he’d been focusing previously.”

The two of them ascended through the last room of the tower, a private meditation chamber at the top, before climbing through a trapdoor in the roof. The fluctuating green skies of the plane greeted them there, though the alien quality never disappeared from the place. Other spires hung out in the distance, rising up out of the ocean of ink as theirs did, punctuated by the occasional island made of black metal and stone. The base of the tower they were on seemed like an island itself, neighbored only by a few other islands and walls forming the canals. The bridge from whence they’d entered Apocrypha was nowhere to be seen.

The two of them walked over to the wall on top of the tower, leaning against the crenellated parapets to watch the multiple skies intersect above them. There was still no breeze, yet the still, muggy air felt like a comforting blanket. They almost lost track of time until a pile of backpacks flew up from the ground far below and landed next to them.

As opposed to her agitated defensiveness on Nirn, Tammaeroth seemed unconcerned by any strange happenings on Apocrypha, and she just moved to give space to the bags. “Where the heck did that come from?” Lloyd asked while staring at the bags. His question was answered swiftly.

“Aarrgggh! Put me down you idiot, I didn’t mean like this!” the familiar, aggressive voice of Nurana echoed from somewhere down below. Tammaeroth found it amusing, but Lloyd leaned in between the crenellations to see what was happening.

Climbing up the side of the tower was Namazu, gripping the side of the structure with its hands and even its feet, which bore a curious opposable toe on the side, without causing any damage to the façade of the building. In its mouth it had Nurana by the belt, gentle hooking her leathers over its needle-like teeth to carry her straight up the side of the tower like a dog carrying a disobedient puppy. Its big, slightly dim-witted yet oddly expressive eyes stared up at the pair already up there, but it didn’t increase its pace as it climbed.

“Why did you leave me for so long!” Nurana yelled when she saw the two of them watching her. “It made me go on a tour of a library of books nobody wants to read. I’m not even making an insult, that’s literally what the Seekers called it - the hall of uninteresting tomes!”

Rearing its neck back, Namazu heaved and tossed her up the rest of the way with its mouth. She shrieked, but Lloyd and Tammaeroth both caught her in midair and pulled her up the rest of the way. They didn’t exactly need to since Namazu’s aim was precise, but she clung to them anyway, visibly upset. They helped her stand up, giving the Lurker wide berth as it joined them, walked across the roof, and sat with its legs dangling over the opposite side, staring at the sky like a hopelessly stupid, unimaginably contended simpleton.

Nurana readjusted her belt while the two of them brushed her off. “I can’t believe you let them keep me there. You both just disappeared to this lame tower.”

Lloyd could feel Tammaeroth stiffen nervously at the same time he did. “Well, yes, you’re right. We’re sorry about that, but it took so much time to organize…and those records you stole from the prison, they were quite voluminous,” Lloyd said. Tammaeroth nodded, maintaining the charade.

“I didn’t take those books,” Nurana said with disinterest. “Nor would I. I’m not a butler.”

“Wait…didn’t you show them to the butler?” Tammaeroth asked in confusion.

“Nope. I don’t remember that at all.”

“Nurana, you literally were the one who found the keys to that room,” Lloyd insisted.

“Oh by the Golden Eye, you’re both so weird! I can’t believe this is how my life will end.”

Lloyd crooked his neck back to look at her in surprise. “That’s a morbid way to start a conversation after we haven’t seen each other for a while.”

“Well, it’s the life we all share, so that’s what’s on my mind.”

Showing a surprising ability to let go of the past, Tammaeroth pinched the other daedra’s arm the way she sometimes did with Lloyd. “Have you considered all the ghosts of mortals floating around here? And the mortals with extended lives, which I’m assuming the Seekers whispered about?”

Nurana’s jaw dropped, and she removed her helmet melodramatically, revealing that her eyes had turned yellow like Tammaeroth’s during her induction to the realm. “What!” she shrieked loudly enough to cause Namazu to grunt in a scolding manner. “What the hell - you never told me we can make him live longer!” she exclaimed while pointing at Lloyd like an object.

“You don’t need to yell,” he said, though he was completely ignored.

“Why wouldn’t you tell me this earlier!”

“Calm down, I thought you knew, oh queen of gossip,” Tammaeroth said while dropping her voice in hopes that the Seducer would too. “That’s not a guarantee, by the way-“

Nurana grabbed both of them by the collars of their cloaks and yanked them close enough to berate them without yelling. “The hell it is, we need to find a way to make this happen! I don’t want to die!”

“Nurana, please calm down,” Lloyd said while patting her on the shoulder.

“I don’t want to die, damnit!”

“We heard you, and believe me when I say that if I have a choice, I’d slightly prefer not to die one day,” Tammaeroth said, garnering an unintelligible noise from Nurana’s mouth. “I’ve considered both options. It’s not the end of the world-“

“Yes it is, literally, you Aedra-worshipper!” Nurana retorted, causing Tammaeroth to gasp in offense and Lloyd to shake his head at her. “What - why are you both ganging up on me!”

“You’re the only one being aggressive,” Lloyd said.

“I feel like I’m being attacked here!”

“You’re not,” Tammaeroth said.

Nurana tried to cuss at them in what sounded like the same Ehlnofex dialect the Dremora would use, but the two of them consoled her like they had on the bridge despite her ire. “This is the biggest deal, and should be the biggest goal, I don’t know how you both couldn’t have already been working on this!”

“Sshhh,” Lloyd said as the two of them both removed her balled up fists from their clothes. “Everything in due time.”

“You’re both going to be the end of me,” Nurana whined.

“Then let it be the grandest ending a daedra could imagine, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health,” Tammaeroth said, though Lloyd did a double take and wondered if she’d understood the expression the way he’d used it.

The Dark Seducer frowned childishly but relented. “Fine,” she said while throwing her hands up in the air. “I’m ready to accept your apologies for leaving me on the universe’s most boring tour, by the way.”

“It’s not that bad,” Tammaeroth replied, though Nurana only tutted her tongue and turned her back to them. “Are you going to act like this every time you don’t get your way?”

“Now and forever,” Nurana said without looking at them. She walked over to the parapets and stared off in the distance, obviously fuming. Tammaeroth walked over to her and Lloyd followed suit, both of them unfolded her arms for her and immediately regretted the attempt to console her, right after she misread their gesture and wrapped one arm around each of them and pulled them against her. “I accept your apologies,” she said, not noticing how nervous she’d made the two of them again.

“Uh…thank you,” Lloyd said uncomfortably as the Seducer held her arms firmly around their necks. He glanced over at Tammaeroth and noticed her staring straight ahead, as awkward in the position as he was. Knowing that they’d both had sex with Nurana made the level of closeness the Seducer was comfortable with make them even less comfortable. “So…What are we waiting for?” he asked, unable to subtly pull away from the group hug.

The answer came from slightly above them, expanding over the whole windless sky without booming or echoing.

“There’s nothing more to wait for, my loyal servant. All of your duties for now are complete, and all that awaits you is in the arena of Mundus.”

The three of them all looked up to find a mass of eyes and tentacles had materialized in the air just off of the tower. Hermaeus Mora waited for their reply, and when the two daedra knelt down, Lloyd followed suit without knowing if there was some sort of a protocol or not. None of them spoke, leaving the Prince of Fate to address them freely.

“The time has come for you to do my will in your birth realm, Seeker Aspirant. The pursuit of knowledge is under assault all over your world, and those both willing and able to do so dwindle in number as the years pass by. The deadly sin of ignorance has become commonplace among the peoples of Nirn. This must be fought; your world requires correction. From my many gifts to you is the duty of curing this disease of censorship which exists on a part of your world right now.”

When the daedric prince fell silent for a moment, Lloyd looked up and spoke. “I’m honored, Lord Mora; what must be done?” His question caused the deep, almost pulpy-sounding voice to hum happily.

“You’re enthusiasm pleases me, my servant. You’re most deserving of the education of the people of Northern Elsweyr. Know that your task will be difficult, and many people will fight you without cause. You won’t be able to contact me while you’re there, and you won’t have the privilege of visiting Apocrypha for an extended period of time. Such is the blessing of I, Hermaeus Mora, Master of the Tides of Fate. My gifts to me servants may only be borne by the most intelligent and most enduring.”

“I’m ready, Lord Mora; I, and those you’ve entrusted to me,” Lloyd replied.

“Then rise, and open a portal. You don’t know where the location is, but you have the knowledge of teleportation in you, though you knew not before you entered my realm. Open a portal, and I can direct it to the correct location so that you may fight the armies of ignorance in my name. Open a portal, and accept the mystery which lies ahead.”

Lloyd stood up, as did Tammaeroth and Nurana. “As you wish,” he replied uneasily, having not yet mastered portal magic and wondering how the daedric prince expected him to know how.

In another one of the oddities he’d witnessed in the past few weeks, though, he began chanting the most basic beginning phrases he’d learned when studying and found the rest of the incantation flowed from his voice naturally. A slow, steady expenditure of his Magicka pool followed, and he found the hand movements required to weave the spell bizarrely familiar in his muscle memory. He’d never successfully casted such mystic spells, yet over the few minutes he needed to channel the power, he found the spell surprisingly clear in his mind, if time consuming. He was fairly certain that the Scryer contributed to the spell as well just to speed it along.

A few minutes of concentration later, and Lloyd found both his Magicka spent and a glowing sphere floating in front of them containing the shimmering image of arid steppeland. The portal spell had worked perfectly…except that it was a few yards away from the tower and hanging over the ocean.

“Oh dear,” he said upon realizing that he’d casted the spell in the wrong direction. He’d been so concentrated that he’d not only missed the fact that he was casting at the wrong place, but also that the fishy giant had hopped down onto the roof and walked passed them. “My apologies, Lord Mora. I haven’t done this before.”

“Fear not, my humble servant, for the Inevitable Knower foresaw this. My pet will assist you and your thralls in your journey to Nirn.”

As soon as the all-encompassing voice paused, all three sets of travel gear went flying through the air, save the third enchanted cloak of chameleon, which Nurana had worn while he was casting the spell. He turned to see that Namazu had grabbed their stuff and thrown everything straight into their portal. Without warning, the ichthyoid horror lifted Tammaeroth off of the ground like a child’s battle pet.

Lloyd balked. “You can’t be serious-“

Tammaeroth showed no fear, though she did yelp in surprise when Namazu tossed her in the air, too. Soaring over the ocean far below them, she hit the portal dead on, but that didn’t make the sight any less terrifying; if the sea monster threw them even a few inches off, they’d plunge into the ink, which the Breton guessed was probably not a healthy endeavor.

The Lurker reached for Nurana next. “Wait, I’m not ready, I’m not ready, I’m not ready I’m not ready I’M NOT READY-“

Her robes fluttered behind her as she soared through the air like a rag doll, unprepared despite Namazu’s gentle, careful grip. She flew into the sphere dead center, and the blurry image of her body hitting the dirt wavered inside of the shimmering sphere. Lloyd’s turn was next, and he saw no point in resisting.

“Please aim precisely,” he said as the Lurker flung him through the air too. He didn’t look down so as to avoid scaring himself, and all he saw was a shimmering globe against the green skies followed by a pile of sand, which he landed in right next to his two daedric thralls.

Once they were all gone, the portal closed in reaction to its caster having entered, collapsing in on itself and leaving the Tower of Paradox empty again. Namazu’s part complete, the Lurker did a cannonball dive off of the tower, splashing in the inky ocean below.

Laughter echoed all across the horizon, from all eight cardinal directions which existed in the unique physics of the plane. The many-eyed representation of the plane’s prince lingered for a moment, working out its laughter at the way the vertebrates flailed as they soared through the air.

“That never gets old.”


	100. They Lived

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story ends at the beginning of the Northern Elsweyr chain.

Nurana coughed and shook all of the sand out of her cloak, scowling at the savannah itself as she took in Northern Elsweyr for the first time. “I hate this place,” she said while grimacing at the shrubbery and cacti dotting the arid hills.

Lloyd was already busy reassessing their backpacks to ensure there were no losses. “Then we can do our best to…let’s see, we have money and water, but no map…we can do our best to make a difference in this land, and make it that much more suitable for seekers of knowledge.” Nurana was unconvinced, but he continued searching their packs and left her to grumble and pace.

Tammaeroth was already scouting the landscape, however, and held a hand over her eyes while she looked to what seemed to be the north, if the position of the sun was any indicator. “I see a road, and a group of people. Four of them, Altmer.”

“Pompous bloodsacks,” Nurana huffed.

“Call the, what you want, but we don’t know where we are, and they probably do,” Tammaeroth replied. “We need to ask them where we are, otherwise we’ll just waste out here until we drink all of our water.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Lloyd said firmly without waiting for a response, ending the argument. Nurana frowned yet didn’t resist as he’d expected.

The three of them wore their backpacks and traversed the dusty hills and plains, following the four bodies near a tent off in the distance. None of them spoke to conserve energy, and the ten minutes it took them to walk all the way to the tent by the lonely desert road passed quickly. The four Altmer had seen them approaching in the distance, standing in a row to receive them, and the two daedra women pulled their hoods low over their heads.

When they were close enough to see the details of the four high elves’ eyes, one of them approached. A Thalmor. Both of Lloyd’s companions tensed up, but he raised a hand for them to stay back while he walked forward with his palms open.

“That’s far enough, traveler; official business,” the Thalmor officer warned while striking a judgmental drill sergeant’s posture. Voices murmured in the tent, but one of the Dominion soldiers kicked the flap, ending the sound.

“I’ll remain here on the road, then,” Lloyd replied to the officer, who was standing off the beaten path. The tent, tucked against a sandy hill, bulged as people - ostensibly - moved around inside. “We’ve traveled a long way, but sadly, we’re lost. Would you be so kind as to direct us to the nearest settlement?”

Unflinching and unsympathetic, the Thalmor officer barely moved a muscle. “No, I’m afraid that I would not. The nearest settlement is Riverhold, which is currently besieged by illegal forces.”

“Could you direct us to the nearest other settlement, then?” Lloyd asked.

The officer’s steely expression never changed. “No, that won’t be possible. The nearest other settlement is even further than that, and you’re unlikely to reach it safely. You may return from whence you came as your safest exit.”

Though still smiling politely, Lloyd felt his irritation boiling up inside. “That’s a rather difficult task, kind sir. We’ve traveled a long way, and returning won’t be possible given our current amount of provisions. Any settlement here, no matter how far, would suffice as long as this road can take us there.”

“It cannot,” the officer said coldly. “If you have nothing further to ask, then I’ll have to ask you to move along. You’re presence impacts on our mission here.”

A voice broke out from the tent. “So you’re sending more people to die without even mentioning an itinerary?” came the voice of another Altmer, though one who was most certainly not a friend to the Dominion agents. “You’re powerless to help, but not to hurt!” One of the soldiers opened the flap and kicked inside, causing several other people to cry out.

Lloyd made no secret of the attention he was paying to the commotion, but the Thalmor officer’s eyes didn’t move away from him. “I would prefer not to use such strong language, but if you don’t continue on your journey now, I’ll have to issue you a citation for your interference.”

Though still smiling, the Breton was sure that his expressions lack of sincerity had become apparent. “I’d gladly continue on my way, but I don’t know where it is, officer,” Lloyd said, carefully enunciating his words to avoid revealing his agitation. “If you could tell me where we could find any signs of civilization, then I’d leave you to your business immediately.”

The Thalmor officer’s jaw strained; both men were refusing to budge. “By the power invested in me by the Aldmeri Dominion-“

“The Dominion has abandoned us to the Euraxians!” cried out a Khajiit woman from inside the tent. One of the soldiers growled and kicked the tent hard, and then she started to cry for real.

“If the Thalmor have the resources to arrest these ones, then why not spend the resources to help-“

The last person yelling inside the tent, a very young Khajiit from the sound of him, was silenced when one of the soldiers bent down and looked inside. A vein bulged in the officer’s forehead in reaction to the interruption.

A lot of memories welled up inside of Lloyd. Without considering the proportion of morality of his actions, he drew a bastard sword he’d found at his tower in Apocrypha, an arcane blade with a living, sentient eyeball fused into the cross guard. The officer reacted in kind, drawing his own sword much faster as if he’d expected a confrontation. The supporters of both side scrambled, but not before the officer struck, bringing his blade against Lloyd’s. The glass sword clattered against the longer hand-and-a-half sword, and Lloyd used that reach to parry the strike in a long arc. The officer was more experienced and skilled, bringing the sword back up and stabbing at Lloyd’s neck, but the glass sword failed to cut through the chain mail coif hidden beneath the hood around the Breton’s shoulders. When Lloyd struck back, his sword glowed green and cut straight through the breastplate hidden beneath the Thalmor officer’s robes, corroding the metal until the sharp edge ate through it; the expression of shock on the officer’s face told of how little the man had expected an edged weapon to threaten him, and the officer’s eyes continued to bulge even after Lloyd pushed his sword further through and cut the other man down.

Soaring past Lloyd’s head on either side, his daedric thralls both attacked. To his left, a bolt of lightning struck a charging soldier with such force that the man was flung backward, ragdolling against the sand and spreading embers as his body began to disintegrate. To his right, a fireball slammed into another Thalmor soldier, causing the other man’s charge to turn into a sorry stumble followed by a crawling, agonizing death. The fourth Thalmor official fled, prompting Nurana to give chase until she caught up with him a distance away and hacked him to death with her war axe. Lloyd tried to inspect the tent, but Tammaeroth held him back protectively, insisting that she check first. She pulled back the flap, causing a measure of fear in the occupants at first even though they wouldn’t have detected her true nature though the enchanted cloak. When she was sure the occupants were harmless, she nodded for Lloyd to come.

“Don’t be afraid, friends; our conflict isn’t with you,” he said before he could even see them.

He peeked inside, finding a sorry sight: half a dozen people sat inside, bound like prisoners. One of them was the renegade Altmer, dazed and bruised after having been kicked in the face; another looked like a pitiful, aching Senche cat bound with a muzzle on its snout and wires wrapped around its toes; the normal were typical Khajiit, or at least, typical in the view of the Breton who had very little experience with the various species. They all seemed a bit afraid of him, but he sheathed his bastard sword in front of them and held his open palms out again.

“Please, allow me to release your bonds. We mean you no harm.”

He released one of the Khajiit, a quiet older woman, who then helped him release the others. She took special care to inspect the grimacing Altmer quietly cursing in his language. “You did my people’s reputation a favor by ending those fascists, stranger,” the rebel Altmer groaned.

“May all the peoples of Tamriel be united regardless of race,” Lloyd prayed out loud, reducing the Altmer’s anger enough for the older Khajiit woman to start massaging some of the blood under his bruised eye down the length of his face.

The others took special care for the poor Senche cat; the otherwise majestic creature took weak, agonizing footsteps on paws which had been injured, probably by the Thalmor themselves. They all led the big cat to lay down while they inspected its paws, no longer afraid of the three strangers who’d rescued them. Nurana joined the rest of them, dumping the pieces of the Thalmor agent she’d axe-murdered and giving Lloyd a smoldering look. He furrowed his brow at her.

“That was hot, how you power-played that chump,” she whispered while passing behind him, causing him to stiffen up.

“Nurana! Not in front of other people!” he whispered back, but to no avail.

“She’s right; I enjoyed seeing that,” Tammaeroth whispered from the other side of him. Overruled and nearly blushing, he floundered and tried to ignore them to maintain his refined posture in front of the strangers.

Fortunately, what happened next surprised him so much that he forgot the way his two companions were making him hot and bothered in the already hot and bothersome weather. “Thank you, stranger,” the Senche cat said in perfectly intelligible speech. Lloyd’s jaw almost dropped, but he pretended to hiccup in order to avoid causing offense. “We didn’t know what they planned to do to us,” the big cat spoke again, causing the Breton to pause in awe before replying.

“Travelers must show generosity, lest we all find ourselves deprived of help,” he replied while holding a fist over his heart. “What happened to you?”

The irritable Altmer grumbled while the Khajiit matriarch tended to his face. “An illegitimate military coup took place in the capital city of Anequina province, but the Dominion has declined to send help,” the anti-nationalist high elf said. “They claim their priority is Cyrodiil. These are supporters of the Northern Elsweyr Defense Force.” The man motioned toward the rest of the Khajiit seated around the Senche cat, which nodded and spoke with its sentient, articulate speech again.

“These ones provide supplies and communications for the Defense Force,” the Senche cat said while nodding toward the Khajiit, “and that one traveled all the way from Summerset to rally more of the high elves to Anequina’s defense,” it said while nodding toward the Altmer.

“The Thalmor ought to have thanked you all for doing their job for them,” Lloyd said, though the Altmer proved too cynical to accept the sympathy.

“They tried to arrest us at our camp out here. They know of the negative sentiment toward the government here due to my publicizing the Defense Force’s efforts, and they’re aware that the others assist with messaging and awareness-raising. They won’t lift a finger to help the people of this land, but they were rather eager to censor our efforts.”

Rubbed the wrong way by the mention of censorship, Lloyd felt his anger toward the now-dead Thalmor agents grow even while he remained aloof toward the strangers. “If any of you are traveling to a nearby city, then we’ll assist you in your efforts on the way there,” he said, glancing at Tammaeroth in his peripheral vision and waiting for her to nod in agreement. She did, though Nurana also tugged on his hood, not wanting to be excluded from the decision.

The Khajiit were all relieved, and even the pessimistic Altmer seemed happy. “You’ve helped these ones so much, stranger, but more help won’t be refused,” the Khajiit woman who’d cried out earlier said. “We must reach Riverhold before sunset. The Thalmor burned the letters we carried, and we must arrive there before we forget the contents.”

“I think we can help you memorize those contents along the way, if you’re willing to make them known,” the Breton offered. At that, the Altmer did appear hesitant, though he didn’t resist when the others reacted so positively.

“These ones will be glad for your help,” the older Khajiit woman said, and the high elf bowed his head and nodded reluctantly when she looked up at him. “Only a few moments of rest are needed.”

Relenting, the Altmer followed suit. “We’d best not linger. Just give us a minute or two, and we’ll all be on our way.”

“Of course,” Lloyd replied while removing his water skin from his backpack and offering it to them, much to Nurana’s frantic tugging on his cloak. “Here. We have water of our own, but if we’re conservative, we can make this last until the evening.”

The whole group looked surprised by the gift. “Thank you, those soldiers drank all of our water!” the Senche cat said.

Lloyd nodded and stepped away from the group, leaving them to nurse their wounds and stretch their joints. The two daedra in disguise joined him, huddling in a triangle while they planned.

“That was our water, Lloyd!” Nurana whispered.

“Calm down, you and Tammy both have water skins as well.”

Rather than argue, Tammaeroth just focused on their goals. “We can make our water last if we can reach a city by sundown, as they claim; Magnus is at its zenith, so we must be conservative.”

“We will, don’t worry; that was only a peace offering. I don’t plan on giving them anymore.”

“A peace offering!” Nurana whispered harshly. “We saved them from the Thalmor, they should be giving stuff to us!”

“Careful; we’re strangers in a strange land. If we’re to fight the light of ignorance here, then abusing the locals won’t help us in that. These people were punished for spreading information…maybe that’s what Lord Mora wants.”

Nurana almost spoke, but Tammaeroth shook her head, and they both looked to the point of their threesome with more experience serving the Demon of Knowledge. “Lord Mora doesn’t typically give orders in the form of riddles; he isn’t Azura,” she said, causing Nurana to shut up and listen right away. “The doors of Apocrypha are obvious, even if they keys to them are not. If these people have been tasked with spreading knowledge in spite of suppression, whether by Thalmor or an illegitimate government, then they’re deserving of our help.”

She was preaching to the choir with Lloyd, but they both stared Nurana down until the Seducer squirmed and became pliant. “Fine, whatever. But you both need to make up to me for dragging me out here and giving our water away.”

“Nurana, that’s the mission we…” Lloyd stopped himself when Tammaeroth pinched his arm. “…the mission we’ll help each other get through. Don’t worry, we’ll take a break tomorrow if we can reach this city tonight.”

Nose upturned and ego stroked by what she mistook for a victory, Nurana nodded in approval. “I accept your attempt to placate me,” she replied, working hard to maintain her façade of resistance to orders. The two of them let her hold on to that notion and didn’t push the matter further, turning away from he group of ragged messengers and supporters.

In front of them to the north, miles of arid savannah stretched as far as they could see. The landscape was unpleasant after an extended stay in Apocrypha, but they wouldn’t have the chance to return to the fabled plane until they’d satisfied the daedric prince through their efforts.

As the three of them stood and waited, inspecting the landscape, Nurana surprised them again. “Thank you,” she said to them both, though without lookin at them. They both looked at her in the middle, finding the Seducer - usually confident to a fault - refusing to make eye contact.

“For what?” Lloyd asked.

“Just…thank you,” Nurana replied without explaining further.

Tammaeroth pinched her, though Lloyd decided to spare her any embarrassment and just enjoyed the brief, quiet moment they had. They’d come a long way from Alinor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow! Just, wow. When I started this, I was scribbling for fun while watching TV. My initial quandary was whether this should be nine or ten chapters before ending it; I never expected this story to mushroom into the hundred-chapter behemoth it is.
> 
> There’s commissioned art of the three main characters drawn by MischiArt - you can find it on the next if you search hard enough for the character names. I felt so inspired by the way this unplanned story branched out, and by the depth that I was able to add to these characters, that it felt appropriate.
> 
> Perhaps I’ll write more about these three in the future, but only for short stories at this point. This one was meant as an origin story, and it feels befitting; there shouldn’t be any mystery as to their motivations or convictions anymore. Hopefully, these characters will enter my mind soon in short scenarios as patches and updates to ESO are released.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! It’s been fun.


End file.
